Internet-Caused Mistrials Are On the Rise

The NYTimes is running a tip-of-the-iceberg story about how the age of Google is resulting in more mistrials as the traditional rules of evidence, honed over many centuries, collide with the always-on Internet. Especially when jurors carry the always-on Internet in their pockets. (We discussed one such case recently.) "The use of BlackBerrys and iPhones by jurors gathering and sending out information about cases is wreaking havoc on trials around the country, upending deliberations and infuriating judges. ... Jurors are not supposed to seek information outside of the courtroom. They are required to reach a verdict based on only the facts the judge has decided are admissible, and they are not supposed to see evidence that has been excluded as prejudicial. But now, using their cellphones, they can look up the name of a defendant on the Web or examine an intersection using Google Maps, violating the legal system's complex rules of evidence."

Comments

judges oinstructions have always banned this

[peter303]

Its just they have adapt these orders to be extremely explicit about the new kinds of communication. Face it, the average juror may not be that sharp and may not realize it until told.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[morgan_greywolf]

Face it, the average juror may not be that sharp and may not realize it until told.

Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, it does not make sense! If Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit!

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[JustOK]

Luke, I am your lawyer!

NOOOOOoooooo!!!!

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[CodeBuster]

Here, look at the monkey...

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[gnick]

Face it, the average juror may not be that sharp and may not realize it until told.

I think that the bigger issue is that the average juror may just not give a shit about the judges instructions.

Frankly, if I want to know the details about a case, why would I trust the media (who are digging deep and trying to sensationalize trivial details in order to keep me from changing the channel) any more or less than the lawyers (who are digging deep and trying to distort facts to try to "persuade" me to vote in their favor)? When you're dealing with bias everywhere, you're tempted to just collect as much data as you can - Even if you're instructed not to and know that it's "wrong".

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Abcd1234]

Frankly, if I want to know the details about a case, why would I trust the media (who are digging deep and trying to sensationalize trivial details in order to keep me from changing the channel) any more or less than the lawyers (who are digging deep and trying to distort facts to try to "persuade" me to vote in their favor)?

Because the lawyers are on opposing sides, and so the balance of the evidence they bring forward should produce a complete picture (unless they're colluding or something). There's simply no way you, with a blackberry, are going to be able to find evidence relevant to the case that the two parties won't already have brought forward (unless they, or the investigators in the case, did a truly terrible job).

The *only* evidence you'll gain access to is that which was ruled inadmissable by the judge. But that evidence is inadmissable for a reason. Who are you to decide whether or not you'll abide by that ruling? I mean, jebus, those rulings are made for a reason!

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[jank1887]

because the judge and opposing counsel are supposed to reign in irrelevancy, speculation, statements unsupported by fact, etc. We all know how good the media is at that.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Anonymous Coward]

But that's just it, you're not dealing with bias "everywhere". You're dealing with two very specific biases, the prosecution and the defence. And (in theory) they're supposed to cancel out, and you can work out the "truth" by seeing both sides of the story. You're absolutely not dealing with bias in the media, because you're not bloody well consulting with the media during the trial. If you're listening to the media at all, you are, as they say, Doing It Wrong. And your proposed solution to this Doing It Wrong is to further compound your error by collecting as much data as you can from other biased sources. You don't avoid bias by seeking out more bias.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[ryturner]

Who are you to decide whether or not you'll abide by that ruling?

If I am on the jury, then I am one of the citizens who will be deciding the outcome of the case. If I am going to be deciding something, I would like to be able to hear all of the facts. Let me decide how much weight to give each piece of biased information.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Abcd1234]

I would like to be able to hear all of the facts.

And my point, which you apparently completely missed, is that the system of justice we have results in the relevant facts being brought to light because each side is interested in providing evidence to support their case. What you're claiming is that there may be evidence brought up by neither the prosecution nor the defense that will affect the trial. But if that's the case, then either the prosecution or the defense has done a very terrible job, or, and this is far more likely, you or the "evidence" you've dug up are in error (otherwise one of the sides would've already mentioned it).

Here, let me try to put it more succinctly: the *entire point* of an adversarial justice system is to remove bias, because any bias present in the evidence provided by the defense will be countered by arguments and evidence offered by the prosecution, and vice versa.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[ShadowRangerRIT]

The rules are in place to prevent you from making your decision based on that information. You know the whole rule about illegal search and seizure? If you make your decision based on knowledge obtained in an illegal search and publicized in the media, when it was clearly illegal and prohibited at trial, you remove one of the constraints preventing us from descending into a police state. If the police can get convictions through arbitrary, illegal searches, they will. Even if you are innocent, arbitrary illegal searches could tie you to any number of crimes through circumstantial evidence. The rules don't just protect the defendant, they protect our whole system of justice from going out of control.

Does your sense of curiosity outweigh that?

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Anonymous Coward]

It's all about Jury Nullification. The point of having the "Common Man" compose the jury is to bring "Common Sense" to the law as it is applied in a given community. Of course, "Justice Professionals" have no interest in allowing laymen to exercise any judgment what-so-ever. Casting a verdict in America today is the equivalent to a child deciding between two outfits its mother picked out for them.

I say go with your gut and use all the information at your disposal. The "Letter of the Law" be damned. Jurists are the only component that interfaces with morality in our entire Justice System.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Hyppy]

Who are you to decide whether or not you'll abide by that ruling?

Jury nullification applies, I would think. The final check and balance is not the judge, it is the people.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[SkyDude]

Let me decide how much weight to give each piece of biased information.

Here, here!

I was called for jury duty several years ago, and although not selected, I went home at lunch time and looked up the defendant's name on Google. The prospective jurors were told the defendant in the trial we were being screened for was charged with rape of a child under 14. Google found a newspaper article about the crime, and the article mentioned the guy had other arrests and convictions for similar crimes.

As you say, the individual can give weight or not to the publicly available information. The question to be raised is will it matter? Newspapers or internet sources are not a reliable source of information when it comes to crime reporting. I have to admit that knowing about the defendant's past was enlightening, and, if the decision to convict or not was close, that bit of background information might have swayed my vote to convict, had I actually sat on the jury. I'll never know.

We must expect a jury to not be tainted by uncorroborated stories; lawyers use the phrase "a sterile jury". In the days before search engines, my search for information wouldn't have been possible. Now that such a search is possible, it can only influence the process. I'm not sure how it can help, but I'll come down on the side that thinks it could definitely hurt.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[gnick]

What you're claiming is that there may be evidence brought up by neither the prosecution nor the defense that will affect the trial. But if that's the case, then either the prosecution or the defense has done a very terrible job, or, and this is far more likely, you or the "evidence" you've dug up are in error...

...or the evidence has been suppressed for some reason - Dismissed as hearsay, irrelevant to the case, or whatever. The guy accused of killing the hooker was the son of a hooker and she beat him while he was growing up? Likely unpresentable, but the prosecution would likely bring it up if they could. Data that is not legally admissible is still data, even though it may never make it to a jury's ears for whatever reason. It may be bad or grey-area data, but it's still data.

Note - I'm not implying that the jury should hear everything, but there are often things that one side would love to present that they cannot - And not just because they're doing "a very terrible job".

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Phoobarnvaz]

I think that the bigger issue is that the average juror may just not give a shit about the judges instructions.

It goes even deeper than this...serving on a jury is a hassle for most people...as well as a waste of time & money for those who are inconvenienced. Caring about jury directions with a legally captive group of people is asking for too much.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[AnnoyaMooseCowherd]

What's to stop either side in a case disseminating plausible but fake information around sites that rank highly in Google for searches relating to the case?

In this way a jury member that is looking there for "all the information at their disposal" could be significantly prejudiced without the other side being aware.

Surely this is one of the reasons why such rules exist?

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Anonymous Coward]

You do know they generally have very good reasons why the evidence is not admissible, right? Juries aren't supposed to listen to hearsay, whether they want to or not. I'm sure the lawyers on either side would also love to just make shit up, but do we let the jurors make up their own evidence? No.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Snaller]

"Face it, the average juror may not be that sharp "

Isn't that great - to be sent to prison by someone who isn't that sharp.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Kral_Blbec]

I personally despise the idea of "inadmissible" evidence. Optimally, the court is looking for the truth but an environment where critical information can be thrown out because of a technicality it is inherently flawed in finding said truth. The information that should be inadmissible is false information.

"Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, we are going to ignore the fact that the accused was found at the scene of the crime with the bloody knife in his hand standing over the victim on the grounds that the arresting officer hit him with his night stick too many times...."

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[drinkypoo]

There's simply no way you, with a blackberry, are going to be able to find evidence relevant to the case that the two parties won't already have brought forward (unless they, or the investigators in the case, did a truly terrible job).

Oh, and that would be a shock, wouldn't it?

Even the summary mentions the ability to "examine an intersection using Google Maps" which is a clear counterexample to your theory. I didn't RTFA either, but at least I RTFS.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[ncc74656]

Isn't that great - to be sent to prison by someone who isn't that sharp.

Considering that juries are mostly made of people not quite clever enough to get out of jury duty, that's most likely what's happening.

(Say what you will about jury service being a responsibility...given the financial disadvantage it imposes on the sorts of people who you'd rather have on a jury, it's more than a little bit of an imposition. I've received more than one jury summons. If I could afford the time off, I wouldn't have minded sitting on a jury. Unfortunately, my employers at the various times wouldn't have paid me while I was pulling jury duty and the compensation offered by the court amounts to less than minimum wage.)

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Anonymous Coward]

Its just they have adapt these orders to be extremely explicit about the new kinds of communication. Face it, the average juror may not be that sharp and may not realize it until told.

From what I've seen jurors are picked for their lack of intelligence.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Tanktalus]

I personally despise the idea of "inadmissible" evidence. Optimally, the court is looking for the truth but an environment where critical information can be thrown out because of a technicality it is inherently flawed in finding said truth. The information that should be inadmissible is false information.

"Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, we are going to ignore the fact that the accused was found at the scene of the crime with the bloody knife in his hand standing over the victim on the grounds that the arresting officer hit him with his night stick too many times...."

Right, because officers beating someone too many times would never take a homeless man, or other so-called "undesirable" and frame them?

Hearsay is false information because its authenticity can't be proven. "Bob told Sue who told Marge who told Sam who mentioned to my best friend's aunt's sister that he heard that the defendant did it." WTF? People are generally trusting, and juries would get tainted by this. It's thrown out for good reason, though the media is more than happy to print anything sensational.

Information gained by torture, or any other undue pressure, is also thrown out (though why evidence gained from 16-hour "interrogations" is admissable, I don't know). Entrapment is thrown out. Time and again, information that is thrown out is false, even if it happens to be truth. That's what inadmissible means. Stuff that naive people would believe, when the logic of the situation has failed.

Yes, it could be that the police illegally raided a house and found some sicko with child porn lining the walls. But that invasion of privacy is "false". They could have just as easily raided any other random house and broken the door of someone who was perfectly innocent, and thus, we, as a society, have determined that it is better for one person to go free than for everyone to live in fear of the police knocking down their doors.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Kral_Blbec]

"Time and again, information that is thrown out is false, even if it happens to be truth"

What in the world does that mean? If it is true, use it. If not, dont.
If someone was framed by a bad cop, then you can prove that. Hearsay when sometimes true, sometimes not. Figure it out, dont just throw it all away.

I'm not saying beleive everything you hear no matter the source, just that all valid sources should be used instead of just ignoring them.

The way to prevent abuse as in the later where the police arbitrarily raid somewhere is not to give what ever they might find a free pass, but to heavily heavily punish the offending officers when they DONT find anything.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Anonymous Coward]

the balance of the evidence they bring forward should produce a complete picture (unless they're colluding or something).

You obviously have great faith in all lawyers' abilities. I'd like to present my evidence to the contrary:

• Public Defendent - your local DA office
• David Boies - Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP

Yep. All lawyers are always in the job only for truth and justice, and never never screw the pooch.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Tanktalus]

That just embrazens the police to try again and again. Who is going to punish the officers when they don't find anything? The police? I know I don't trust the police that much. They've proven that they stick together, through their actions and through the actions of their unions.

The only people who can punish the police are the judges. Even they seem to have their hands in the cookie jar far too often (as many of the judges come from prosecutorial backgrounds, which means they probably have a too-close relationship with cops to begin with). But, when they do want to punish the cops, they have to have something in front of them. What's the likelihood of the owner of a house "accidentally" mistaken for a drug den or a gang hideout actually going and filing civil charges against the cops? Near zero. So the only time you get the cops in front of the judge for illegal searching is when the DA files charges, i.e., the cops actually found something. If the judge then okays the evidence, you end up with the cops being rewarded for their illegal behaviour, and they'll just do it again and again. Short of losing their badge, there is no punishment severe enough to get cops to only do illegal searches when they're right, and I'm not even sure that that is severe enough: cops often have superiority and god complexes, thinking that because they enforce the law, they're above it.

Of course, if they were heavily punished for not finding anything, I think KopBusters would suddenly get a lot of job offers. Probably mostly from gangs.

Re:judges oinstructions have always banned this

[Snaller]

Yeah, its a really flawed system, alas.

Easy solution

[smooth wombat]

Every juror is searched every day for any electronic device. No cell phones, no Blackberrys, no nothing. If the rules of court allow it, they get pencil and paper. Otherwise, they sit and listen.

This does not preclude someone from going home and looking up information, but it does solve the issue of doing things in court you shouldn't be doing while on a jury.

Re:Easy solution

[Shakrai]

There are no requirements that they are literate or law abiding

Well I can't speak to the 'literate' requirement but it is generally understand that you need to be able to understand and communicate in the English language. You are dead wrong on the not needing to be law abiding too. A criminal record disqualifies you from jury service in every single state that I'm aware of.

do you really regard the people living anywhere in your county to be your "peers"?

I regard a randomly selected pool of 12 citizens more as my peers than I would some appointed judge or lawyer who may have a political agenda to advance. There are flaws in the jury system but I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Re:Easy solution

[MeanMF]

Last time I reported for Jury Duty they wouldn't even let me bring an iPod into the building, let alone anything with Internet access...I guess it's a state-by-state thing.

Re:Easy solution

[Crazy Man on Fire]

When I was called up for jury duty last summer, I had to surrender my cell phone before going through the metal detector. I think other electronics were prohibited as well. Seems like this would be pretty simple to stop by a small rules change at the court house. Just ban cell phones and similar devices.

Re:Easy solution

[hedwards]

I take it you've never been on a jury. Do you have any idea how dull jury duty is? I was on a month long trial last summer and it was tedious and awkward. We all had very little in common and the one thing we did have in common was off limits for conversation.

It's difficult enough to get people to ditch work for a tiny stipend, imagine knowing that over the period of the trial that one's going to be bored out of ones mind during the many points where the jury isn't needed.

Re:Easy solution

[jonnythan]

That's all well and good in the courtroom but jurors go home at the end of the day. What are you going to do? Start sequestering every jury for every trial?

Re:Easy solution

[sudotron]

[sarcasm]Because having, at some point in one's life, broken one of the labyrinthine maze of laws and rules that govern behavior in this country would obviously mean that one could never, under any circumstances, judge someone fairly and impartially.[/sarcasm]

Sorry--I myself have always wanted to do my civil duty and serve on a jury but know that I will never be able to because of some stupid stuff I did when I was young.

Re:Easy solution

[chalkyj]

What does that have to do with the Internet? Jurors can go home and read a newspaper to find out things that they're not meant to know too. If they want to go out and research things that they are not allowed to from home they don't need the internet to do it.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

ob. xkcd

Re:Easy solution

[jonnythan]

The thing is that they're not supposed to read the newspaper. For one thing, it's relatively easy not to read the newspaper. And for another, the newspaper doesn't contain even a minute fraction of the info that can be found on Google and Wikipedia in 10 seconds.

I can get home from that day's proceedings and have Wikipedia summaries of the law, tons of background info on the defendant and plaintiff, and every news article about the case ever printed in about 2.5 minutes using the internet. How are you going to research case law about employment contracts from home without the internet?

Go read the article. It covers all this.

Re:Easy solution

[sleigher]

Not sure about all states but once you are off parole/probation, your civil rights are returned, and you can then serve on a jury. So making a mistake once does not preclude you from service forever.

Re:Easy solution

[poot_rootbeer]

I myself have always wanted to do my civil duty and serve on a jury but know that I will never be able to because of some stupid stuff I did when I was young.

There's the foolish indiscretions of youth, and then there's felonies.

Re:Easy solution

[Rude Turnip]

An iPod could easily have a news podcast on it.

Re:Easy solution

[smooth wombat]

Books come to mind. Besides, there's nothing that says you can't read online stories or news events. Just not what case you're deciding on. Are you saying you and others lack self-control so that for one month you can't not look at a news article related to your case? (ignore the double negative)

Of course, as the original article relates, the obvious answer is yes. Apparently people lack self-control, and common sense, to not read or listen to any news story about the case they are deciding on or even cases similar to the one you are deciding.

If the fact that the supposedly most intelligent creatures on the planet can't control themselves for one month to not look at something they aren't supposed to look at, then not having access to electronic devices is the price one must pay.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Not dead wrong. How many juries did Bernard Madoff serve on for the last 40 years?

> You are dead wrong on the not needing to be law abiding too. A criminal record disqualifies you from jury service in every single state that I'm aware of.

You assumed that all people who are not law abiding are excluded from jury service because they would have a criminal record, which is ridiculous.

Re:Easy solution

[Ninnle Labs, LLC]

I regard a randomly selected pool of 12 citizens more as my peers than I would some appointed judge or lawyer who may have a political agenda to advance.

Because no one in a jury has a political agenda to advance?

Re:Easy solution

[Archangel Michael]

That is the problem with the system, which explicitly fills large amounts of time with testimony of little or no real value to the case.

Most trials aren't really about "truth" as much as about being "fair". And what is "fair" is totally stacked against the state, and in favor of the defendant.

And people like OJ are free because Furman said the N word (slight over simplification). That's the system. Everyone knows OJ did it.

Re:Easy solution

[jbolden]

Mark Furman perjured himself on the stand and the defense showed that he had violated the law as a matter of course. Obviously evidence he collected needed to be questioned. The prosecution should have double and triple checked the evidence, and had more of it. A murder trial should not come down to a single glove.

Re:Easy solution

[xgr3gx]

Me too. Confiscate the damn things until the jurors leave the trial. Problem solved.
Wow - what a dilemma - what to do with this new electronic world that is hurting our centries old court system.
Give me an F'ing break. !=news. Come on NYTimes!

Re:Easy solution

[yachius]

Because there is a slim to none chance that 12 random people on a jury all have the same agenda.

Re:Easy solution

[djrosen]

Unless its a felony conviction

Re:Easy solution

[Shakrai]

You assumed that all people who are not law abiding are excluded from jury service because they would have a criminal record

Did I miss the part where we changed our legal system to assume that people are guilty until proven innocent?

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

This does not preclude someone from going home and looking up information

So by "easy solution" you really meant "easy".

Re:Easy solution

[jandrese]

The worst part is, the Jury is supposed to be a passive box that just absorbs whatever information the lawyers wish to provide. If you use your brain and start coming up with questions of your own, well, tough because you're not allowed to ask them. Even if one of the lawyers is completely incompetent and missing all sorts of obvious points, you're not allowed to do anything. It is your duty to hang that fellow just because his public defender barely even knows his name, much less his case.

Re:Easy solution

[JustOK]

Yes. Yes you did. It happened almost 8 years ago.

Re:Easy solution

[Cro Magnon]

The people of the jury don't (or shouldn't) know anything about you, so probably have no "agenda". They do have biases, but it's doubtful that all 12 would have the same biases.

Re:Easy solution

[jandrese]

Except that they aren't really randomly selected. Both lawyers get a chance to ask the pool of candidates any questions they want and attempt to stack the jury as much as they can. If one lawyer is good and the other isn't, then your chances of getting a fair trial are already diminished.

Re:Easy solution

[thedonger]

Insightful, indeed. Perhaps the electronics age-induced ADHD over the entire coming-of-age population will render them unfit to just sit and listen for hours at a time, thereby upending our entire justice system.

Note to lawyers: start working on fun and exciting ways to present evidence with lasers and animation, and you are sure to win more trials!

Re:Easy solution

[geekoid]

Make something in common.
Actually, I have come to realize, way to late, that this is the real value of sports. Even if you only mildly pay attention to the local sports you have something to talk about.

No you don't ahve to be a jersey wearing scream at the TV fan.
If I was ever selected for juror duty, I'd make a point to get caught up on local sports.
Since the Blazer are a local team, there is a good chance it will involved them, so my effort could be wasted~
ZING!

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Go read the article.

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

So how do you know what you will be seeing until you see it? Your powers of pre-incognition far surpass mine.

Re:Easy solution

[jweller]

It's difficult enough to get people to ditch work for a tiny stipend

Thats the biggest problem right there. In MD, you get either $15 or $30 a day, and your employer is not required to pay you for time lost.

So let me get this straight: you want to subject me to mind numbing boredom, for little more than the cost of parking and a sandwich? It's little wonder everyone does whatever they can to get out of it. Frankly, it's offensive that you think my time is worth so little.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

that's because the fucking state has the right to hold you for years in a shitty jail feeding you thin piece of bologna on moldy fucking bread, all of this while your waiting for your fucking day in court. and some jello and a fucking small amount of chips. that's why it's fucking stacked against them at trial. they get to fucking destroy your life,your privacy or even your health for their fucking cases most of which are less than fucking circumstantial for years trying to force you not to go to court.

Re:Easy solution

[Ninnle Labs, LLC]

The people of the jury don't (or shouldn't) know anything about you, so probably have no "agenda".

Then you apparently have never served on a jury before. Plenty of jury members have their own agendas and many of them believe that their sole job is to convict people. To be honest, I'd take a judge any day.

Re:Easy solution

[Mikkeles]

'And what is "fair" is totally stacked against the state, and in favor of the defendant.'

Yes; the State only gets to make the laws, the rules of evidence, appoint the judges (at least at the higher levels), have a very large group of investigators working specifically for them, and unlimited time and budget, while the accused has a whole lawyer and a gumshoe.

Totally unfair!

Re:Easy solution

[D Ninja]

If the fact that the supposedly most intelligent creatures on the planet can't control themselves for one month to not look at something they aren't supposed to look at, then not having access to electronic devices is the price one must pay.

Actually, I think it's the fact that we ARE the most intelligent creatures on the planet which is why we DON'T WANT to control ourselves for one month. Humans, by nature, are very curious. We always want to learn more, we always want to see what other people did in various situations or what the results were, etc, etc. And, with the advent of internet always being on all the time, it's so easy to look up this information, humans just do it.

And, as a side note, your comments seems to indicate that you have perfect self-control in every area of your life. My guess is that you don't. "Pot calling Kettle...come in Mr. Kettle..."

Re:Easy solution

[Chyeld]

Really, if you have a reasonable doubt that the crime was commited (i.e. you think the defense hasn't brought up good questions you would ask and thus the issues have not been resolved) why are you voting guilty?

No, you aren't allowed to conduct your own investigations, but that doesn't mean the verdict is down to who looked the best arguing the case. Watch 12 Angry Men some day (and ignore the fact that he broke the rules to convince them to change their minds).

Re:Easy solution

[DragonWriter]

Seems like this would be pretty simple to stop by a small rules change at the court house. Just ban cell phones and similar devices.

As TFA notes, many courts already do this, and it has little effect on the problem, which isn't particularly that people have portable internet devices with them during at the courthouse, but that they go home and research things relevant to the case on the internet, or go home and post information about the case and the jury deliberations to blogs, etc.

Short of sequestering all juries, there's not a lot you can do to pose a substantial barrier to that.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

You are dead wrong on the not needing to be law abiding too. A criminal record disqualifies you from jury service in every single state that I'm aware of.

"Criminal record" and "law abiding" are different things.

Bernie Madoff didn't have a criminal record until this year, but he certainly wasn't law abiding.

Re:Easy solution

[gclef]

you're not allowed to do anything

Of course you are...they just don't want you to know that you are. (Hint: google "jury nullification" some time.) (Hint #2: those two words are a really fast way to get thrown off a jury.)

Re:Easy solution

[jerAzevedo]

This is precisely how the law is supposed to be.

The United States constitution is specifically designed to give the defendant an edge in court. The founding fathers believed that it's better to let a guilty man run free than let an innocent man be found guilty.

Hence all the principles about innocent until proven guilty etc. This is a very important cornerstone of our country and sadly it seems a lot of people don't understand this. A lot of people would rather lock up almost anyone who gets put on trial just to make sure that all the guilty are in fact found guilty. The problem of course is that you end up locking up more innocent people than you do guilty people.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

There's the foolish indiscretions of youth, and then there's felonies.

Yes. When a young Barrack Obama, George W. Bush, or Bill Clinton use illegal drugs, that is foolish indiscretions of youth, but when anyone else does it, it's a felony.

Re:Easy solution

[Zordak]

I can get home from that day's proceedings and have Wikipedia summaries of the law, tons of background info on the defendant and plaintiff, and every news article about the case ever printed in about 2.5 minutes using the internet.

I think you're overestimating the notoriety of the average case. Sure, if you're a juror for OJ Simpson or Michael Jackson, you can read every tiny little detail on Wikipedia. But if you're sitting on the jury for $JUNKIE[357], you probably won't find much except for the defendant's poorly-spelled and gramatically-dubious blog posts about his sexual exploits of questionable veracity. Maybe you'll find something on the arresting officer or DA in the local paper's archives if they've done something really unusual, but again, you're more likely to see a bunch of worthless, profanity-laden, poorly-spelled blog posts from other junkies (these will appear right after their posts about sexual exploits of questionable veracity). And if you end up on the jury for $SLIP_N_FALL[1574], you can probably find some information about the defendant (after all, it has to be big enough to have deep pockets to be worth suing), but it probably won't have anything to do with their policies for posting "Caution" signs after mopping. And the plaintiff is not going to be any more well-known than $JUNKIE.

While it's true that some jurors may be unduly influenced by all that, it won't be because they got the "real story" from the internet. It will be because they're stupid.

Re:Easy solution

[Mr. Slippery]

Most trials aren't really about "truth" as much as about being "fair". And what is "fair" is totally stacked against the state, and in favor of the defendant.

What country do you live in where this is true? Can't be the same one I live in, the one that leads the world in incarceration, where judges and juries typically assume a defendant is guilty. Spend a day in court and see how little evidence it actually takes to have a man locked in a cage for years.

And people like OJ are free because Furman said the N word (slight over simplification). That's the system. Everyone knows OJ did it.

Surely you're not suggesting the Simpson trial is typical of criminal trials?

Anyway, Furman perjored himself. The attitude he displayed, plus missing blood taken from Simpson and curious patterns of bloodstains, suggested that the cops might have planted evidence. The state presented insufficient evidence to prove the Simpson was guilty of the murders. The verdict was correct.

Re:Easy solution

[noidentity]

And people like OJ are free because Furman said the N word (slight over simplification). That's the system. Everyone knows OJ did it.

Everyone? I've never been to the city he lived in, nor was I in the courtroom. I'd rather have some guilty people go free than have an innocent person be put in prison.

Re:Easy solution

[cayenne8]

"Really, if you have a reasonable doubt that the crime was commited (i.e. you think the defense hasn't brought up good questions you would ask and thus the issues have not been resolved) why are you voting guilty?"

Good point.

I've heard it put forth...that when you are on a jury, you are one of the most powerful people in the United States. You could potentially even have power greater than, or over that of the President. You *can* vote how you feel....and it carries a great deal of weight!!

Re:Easy solution

[cayenne8]

"Of course, as the original article relates, the obvious answer is yes. Apparently people lack self-control, and common sense, to not read or listen to any news story about the case they are deciding on or even cases similar to the one you are deciding."

Sounds like we have a new method for getting out of jury duty!!

If shouting out racial or sexual slurs doesn't get your thrown out of the jury pool....claim you are 'addicted' to the internet, and cannot possibly keep yourself from surfing online about everything, including the case you are on.

Re:Easy solution

[gnick]

...or go home and post information about the case and the jury deliberations to blogs, etc.

Short of sequestering all juries, there's not a lot you can do to pose a substantial barrier to that.

Exactly - I'm in a situation right now that reflects that pretty well (my first time serving as a juror).

Actually the judge told us explicitly that if it was made public that Col. Mustard had even been seen with a candlestick, the whole case could be unraveled.

Oh, wait...

Re:Easy solution

[Ironica]

Sorry--I myself have always wanted to do my civil duty and serve on a jury but know that I will never be able to because of some stupid stuff I did when I was young.

Have you tried petitioning to get your record sealed or expunged or excused or something? I know there are methods to do this, specifically because people do stupid things when they're young.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

If the fact that the supposedly most intelligent creatures on the planet can't control themselves for one month to not look at something they aren't supposed to look at, then not having access to electronic devices is the price one must pay.

I'm confused. Dolphins have to pay the court to avoid mistrials?

Re:Easy solution

[Ironica]

Then you apparently have never served on a jury before. Plenty of jury members have their own agendas and many of them believe that their sole job is to convict people. To be honest, I'd take a judge any day.

Me, I'd take a competent lawyer who could get through jury selection without screwing me over.

Re:Easy solution

[cayenne8]

"So let me get this straight: you want to subject me to mind numbing boredom, for little more than the cost of parking and a sandwich? It's little wonder everyone does whatever they can to get out of it. Frankly, it's offensive that you think my time is worth so little."

I can see your point, and I used to think JUST that same way.

But, as I've started over the past years, to really start to pay attention to what's happening in this country, with rights being nullified, changes to laws, expansion of laws, learing more of what I should have been taught in civics class.

I'm thinking the opposite now, in that...do YOU really consider your civic duty to be so worthless? Do you find that the principals for handing out justice (which you or someone you know could easily be on the wrong end of a trial) so worthless, that it isn't worth sacrificing a little of your time and money, to participate....and try to lend (hopefully) an intelligent ear and brain to try to help decide a fellow citizens fate?

Worst case scenario...YOU are falsely accused of something that would mark or ruin you for life, or deprive you of your liberty or very life.

Would you want someone like YOU on your jury....sitting there bored, not paying attention, pisseed about missing work, and just wanting to vote whatever way will get you out of there the fastest?

Something to ponder.....

Re:Easy solution

[cthulu_mt]

If one lawyer is good and the other isn't you're probably fucked even if the jury was completly "fair".

Re:Easy solution

[sleigher]

Are you sure about that? Absolutely 100% sure? Because, I know people with a felony that will claim otherwise. I personally do not know for sure.

Re:Easy solution

[Crazy Man on Fire]

What's the point of this? The judge already instructs jurors not to discuss the trial or do any research. How is "don not discuss the trial" any different from "do not discuss the trial on the internet"? Do we really have to ban discussion of the trial via every different means of communication? How is this really enforceable, anyway?

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

And what happens when they go home for the night?

Unlike you, I've served on a jury a few times. Each trial took several days, each night I went home to my comfy bed, oh and I have and had an always on internet connection. Guess what? I didn't go looking for information about the cases. I listened to the judge.

What needs to happen is any juror found doing this goes straight to jail for 30 days with no contact with the outside world. No trial, do not pass go do not collect $200, bam you're in the slammer. You will probably lose your job and fuck up your life now that you'll have been convicted of a crime.

But once this is known that this can happen and judges do this, then the problem of uneducated, undisciplined idiot children in adult's clothing disobeying direct orders will stop or at least slow down.

Re:Easy solution

[DragonWriter]

What's the point of this? The judge already instructs jurors not to discuss the trial or do any research. How is "don not discuss the trial" any different from "do not discuss the trial on the internet"?

Its not.

Discussing it on the internet just makes you more likely to get caught breaking the rules (hence, the rise in mistrials occasioned by the internet and social media), since the parties to a case are more likely to find your tweet and bring it to the attention of the judge than they are to find the conversation you had with your coworkers around the watercooler at work.

Re:Easy solution

[jonnythan]

It's just as easy to be influenced by an incomplete or incorrect explanation of the pertinent law, the 'discovery' of another law, or another line of the law, that appears to apply to a layman but the judge specifically excluded for a reason, a Google Street View of the scene of the crime, or whatever.

Re:Easy solution

[DragonWriter]

And what is "fair" is totally stacked against the state, and in favor of the defendant.

Actually, its stacked in favor of the side with the most resources to throw at the case.

In criminal cases, that's almost invariably the government. In cases with ultra-rich defendants, it may be the defendant, but while those may be a large portion of the cases that get media attention (the rest being cases with particularly sympathetic or celebrity victims), its a negligible portion of all criminal cases.

And, of course, most civil cases don't involve the government at all except that they play out in the court system, they parties are private entities. So its really a vanishingly small fraction of cases where the government is both involved at all and the party with a structure disadvantage.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

You dope. For fuck's sake, it's Barack. After two goddamn years of campaigning, election and inauguration, I'd expect it to get through your thick skull.

Re:Easy solution

[StikyPad]

Hint #3: It has nothing to do with an incompetent defense. Google it some time.

Nice use of the Chewbacca Defense though. Ladies and gentlemen of the supposed jury, this does NOT make sense.

Re:Easy solution

[Cathbard]

Actually, I think it's the fact that we ARE the most intelligent creatures on the planet which is why we DON'T WANT to control ourselves for one month.

Humans are the most intelligent creatures on the planet? You don't use youtube a lot do you? ;)

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

You dope. For fuck's sake, it's Barack. After two goddamn years of campaigning, election and inauguration, I'd expect it to get through your thick skull.

Like I care? I didn't vote for President Hope&Change.

Re:Easy solution

[khallow]

And people like OJ are free because Furman said the N word (slight over simplification). That's the system. Everyone knows OJ did it.

I'd call that "wrong" rather than a "slight oversimplification". The prosecution ran a poor case throughout. They knew that they were dealing with a top notch defense team yet they were still (as I dimly recall) making bad mistakes throughout the trial.

You also ignore that the key piece of evidence, the glove didn't fit OJ's hands when he tried it on in court. That probably was due to improper care of the glove, but it was enough to secure an acquittal. Remember that the jury didn't spend very long to decide to acquit OJ.

Re:Easy solution

[DarkOx]

No, The want to make you do that because its part of the price of your freedom and the costs associated with the justice the system provides you the other 99.9% of your life.

Do I think the system is ideal no, should lots of things be changed yes, does that give you or I the right to shirk our civic dubty in the mean time of course not!

Re:Easy solution

[NarcolepticPenguin]

Funny enough, New Mexico has no requirements for jurors to be able to speak or understand the English language. Having served on a jury with one individual who required an English/Spanish translator, I can say I wished at the time that it had been a requirement. The translator was required to relay testimony (not so bad) as well as translate all the deliberation and discussion amongst the jurors (that sucked). It was very difficult trying to keep the discussion moving when we had to stop and let the translator keep him up-to-date (and with some of the jurors trying to speak over one another).

Re:Easy solution

[smooth wombat]

And, as a side note, your comments seems to indicate that you have perfect self-control in every area of your life.

Hardly. But I have enough self-control to not do something I'm told to do or don't want to know about. For example, if there was a race on that day and I was taping it and didn't want to know the outcome, I would avoid listening to the news on radio or watching the sports part of tv so I wouldn't know the outcome until after I had watched the race.

Being curious and being able to follow simple directions are two distinct aspects. But I guess if a sign said, "DO NOT TOUCH! 1 MILLION VOLTS!" you'd touch it just because you were curious, right?

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

And here, ladies and gents, we have a prime example of just why "common" sense isn't.

Ever been to a zoo? Bet you were surprised when you saw animals there. Ever looked at a news website. Yeah, I know, they have news there! I'd never have seen that one coming. Oh, and movie theaters? They show movies there.

Common sense. Know it. Use it. Love it.

Re:Easy solution

[Zordak]

I absolutely agree.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Jurors are allowed to ask questions in Oregon courts.

Re:Easy solution

[Varitek]

The founding fathers believed that it's better to let a guilty man run free than let an innocent man be found guilty.

And that should be trivially obvious too - it doesn't take a complicated debate on ethics. When a guilty man is found not guilty, a guilty man goes free. When an innocent man is found guilty, an innocent man is punished and a guilty man goes free.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Legally that may be the case, but morally, if you see someone poor with an incompetent public defender that looks like he's getting railroaded by the system, I think you can make a pretty good case for using whatever resources are at your disposal to try to seek out the truth. We've known for quite some time that poor people don't get treated fairly in our legal system. Why should we revere the regulations that make that so?

Juries have the right to nullification if they feel that a law is unjust in the case they're presented. Why should they not have the right to outside investigation if they feel that the system is unjust in that same case?

Re:Easy solution

[DrVomact]

Last time I reported for Jury Duty they wouldn't even let me bring an iPod into the building, let alone anything with Internet access...I guess it's a state-by-state thing.

You're right, it's definitely worse here in Texas. Last time I was on a jury, they wouldn't let me bring my gun into the courthouse.

Re:Easy solution

[colinrichardday]

And as Alan Dershowitz noted, that might not have mattered had Marcia Clark chosen to try OJ in Brentwood instead of downtown LA.

Re:Easy solution

[Hyppy]

You are dead wrong on the not needing to be law abiding too. A criminal record disqualifies you from jury service in every single state that I'm aware of.

Not all people who break the law are caught. I'd venture a guess to say that most aren't, actually.

Re:Easy solution

[Hyppy]

Unless the judge has ordered the jurors to be sequestered for the duration of the trial, they are free to go home in between sessions.

Re:Easy solution

[Ironica]

I take it you've never been on a jury. Do you have any idea how dull jury duty is? I was on a month long trial last summer and it was tedious and awkward. We all had very little in common and the one thing we did have in common was off limits for conversation.

The one jury I was on had very little in common too... which made things *fascinating*. One guy was the head of new technologies for Citibank, and he and his wife were getting ready to adopt a baby from Korea. Another guy was the president of programming for Showtime. One of the women was a security guard, and had some *awesome* stories. Everyone was very different... and we'd go to lunch together, and talk about our lives and stuff that happened to us that had nothing to do with the case, and it was very cool.

That trial only lasted 9 days, but frankly, we were almost sad to break up the party!

Re:Easy solution

[xgr3gx]

If they are free to go home, then cell phones are no longer the issue.
They can go blog and email much faster with a full size querty keyboard on a computer.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't vote for President Hope&Change.

Yeah! We voted for President Despair&Same!

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Because there is a slim to none chance that 12 random people on a jury all have the same agenda.

unless they all live in Berkely CA.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Juror have the right to nullification, BUT they do not have the right to abrogate legal procedure. Just because jurors THINK they may be fair or more effective by researching outside of the court, does not mean they are.

Jurors are limited to the facts presented in court because those facts have been determined to be true by the legal process, and can be contested by either legal party. When you have jurors getting their facts from wikipedia or the supermarket tabloid, neither party can contest those "facts", and you contaminate the legal proceedings with falsehoods and bias.

Re:Easy solution

[D Ninja]

But I guess if a sign said, "DO NOT TOUCH! 1 MILLION VOLTS!" you'd touch it just because you were curious, right?

Well, some people would (as Cathbard pointed out - YouTube is full of people like this). And, I am thankful for those people. That's why I won't do such a thing because I already know the result.

I am typically pretty good with self-control. And, I now understand your point (it came off very different in your first post, which is why I responded), and I agree with it.

Of course, there is always going to be someone who can't resist. So, as many of the other discussions point out, other actions have to be put in place to handle this.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm thinking the opposite now, in that...do YOU really consider your civic duty to be so worthless?

You're attacking a rather poor straw man. Even if someone is the most fervent believer in their civic duty and hangs on every word spoken during the trial, they're still going to have down time. Sometimes judges and lawyers have to argue about things that jury isn't allowed to listen to. That means the jury gets to sit around and wait, and they often aren't allowed to discuss the trial during that time. It's pure, unadulterated downtime, and no civic ideology will magically make it any more interesting.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

In TEXAS? No gun in a courtroom? Man, 9-11 has been rough on us all. How are you supposed to show your zealous enthusiasm when you get off of the conviction if you can't fire your gun into the air repeatedly?

Re:Easy solution

[Jaysyn]

I don't think this is the case in Florida. I know my brother can't vote or own a firearm at this point in time.

Re:Easy solution

[a-zA-Z0-9$_. !*'(),x]

That's why playing cards were invented. tOM

Re:Easy solution

[sleigher]

I know in some states once your parole/prob is over you can vote, but jury duty evidently is different according to the AC above. Is your brother off parole or probation? He might have to ask the court for his rights back. Which is stupid because if they sentence you, and you serve your time, then why isn't everything returned at completion of the sentence? Basically, when you are sentenced you are sentenced forever. What a great system......

Re:Easy solution

[Professor Fate]

When I did jury duty, we had to go through security, metal detectors and all. The people who smoked had to keep matches because they wouldn't allow a lighter in the building. I think the judge should just clearly state that using such devices is prohibited. If you ignore him/her, it's contempt of court.

Re:Easy solution

[White Flame]

Not to mention that when a guilty man goes free, he'll probably be guilty of something later to nail him on anyway. The pruning will eventually "take".

It sucks when what they're guilty of is heinous, but it is the better option.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

That is like telling a 15yr not to look at porn..and then placing Playboy right in front of him.

Re:Easy solution

[jbolden]

Yep. What a jury pool looks like being a geographic as it, is a real problem with the system.

Re:Easy solution

[colinrichardday]

Usually it works for the prosecution, who can choose where in a county to try a case (and particularly LA county).

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

foolish indiscretions are slowly being labelled as felonies.

Re:Easy solution

[commmorancy]

This only works as long as the jurors are in the courthouse. As soon as they go home for the day, all bets are off. If the trial is that important, then the only solution is for the judge to sequester the jury for the duration of the trial and prevent them from using internet devices, reading newspapers and watching television.

Re:Easy solution

[falconwolf]

The people of the jury don't (or shouldn't) know anything about you, so probably have no "agenda".

Then you apparently have never served on a jury before. Plenty of jury members have their own agendas and many of them believe that their sole job is to convict people.

I'm glad I know different people. Most of the people I know how they stand with regards to laws and trials believe in jury nullification. Myself, I was called for jury duty twice but didn't serve on a jury either tyme. I was hoping I'd be picked for a drug trial so I could use jury nullification.

Falcon

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a fine principled stand to take.

But in the real world I'm on contract, not salary. And the simple fact is that if I don't work, I don't get paid. If I don't get paid, bills don't get paid. Extrapolate that as far as you like. But the end result is I have to do my best to get out of jury duty, or my livelihood, my ability to pay my debts, and my ability to support my partner (He's not a freeloader... he's in med school. Although that's arguably the same thing. ;-) ) is threatened.

Now, if the court were willing to pay my hourly; then yeah, I'd be okay with suffering some boredom in the name of civic duty. But they're not. As the GP mentioned, a day's worth of jury work barely covers a decent lunch! I'd guestimate that I've lost over a grand just sitting in jury selection rooms over the years. The cost to me of actually getting stuck on even a short trial makes it resoundingly in my best interests to escape.

Re:Easy solution

[Jaysyn]

He's been off of probation for many years now. He's working on getting his liberties back, but they've made it a horrible pain in the ass to do so in Florida.

Re:Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Worst case scenario...YOU are falsely accused of something that would mark or ruin you for life, or deprive you of your liberty or very life.

Would you want someone like YOU on your jury....sitting there bored, not paying attention, pisseed about missing work, and just wanting to vote whatever way will get you out of there the fastest?

Something to ponder.....

It happened to me, I was prosecuted for a crime I didn't commit, and the jury was completely lead by one busybody who wasn't even paying attention. She heard one word in the opening witness, and made up her mind.

The rest of the jury, wanting to just go home, agreed with her, and I spent 8 months rotting in fed prison.

Not what I wanted out of my first visit on the wrong side of a jury.

Posting AC 'cause there are still bits of this being fought...

Re:Easy solution

[badkarmadayaccount]

Simple fix: no junkies in the court rooms for the sake of them being junkies. No more victim-less crimes already!

Re:Easy solution

[Uzuri]

At which point the jurors all gang up and kill the judge.

Re:Easy solution

[djrosen]

Yes. I was told specifically, by a judge. I have a Misdemeanor on my record, there are certain types of trials I cannot sit on even with that and if I were to ever get a felony, I would no longer be able to sit on a jury, at least in the Great State of Texas.

Re:Easy solution

[Rakarra]

The glove not fitting was meaningless. A glove, soaked in blood and dried, doesn't fit over a hand that's covered by another latex glove? Of COURSE it won't fit, but the defense played it up and the incompitent prosecution was blindsided. I'll agree with you on one point here, I think the case was completely mishandled by the prosection.

It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

The internet just makes it easier and faster for morons to display their stupid. In the old days, that same jackass who just had to twitter about the trial he's on would have been knocking back beer in a local bar and going on about the trial.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Shakrai]

That was my thought as well. How do you blame technology for some jackass failing to take his civic responsibility seriously?

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[lymond01]

How do you blame technology for some jackass failing to take his civic responsibility seriously?

With technology, he's a more efficient jackass.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[rpjs]

With technology, he's a more efficient jackass.

And easier to catch out, so perhaps this is an improvement.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Anonymous Coward]

The internet just makes it easier and faster for morons to display they're stupid.

You sure got that one right!

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[tompeach]

The internet just makes it easier and faster for morons to display their stupid.

Their what?

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

No, actually, what I meant was "their stupid."

I didn't want to say that the internet makes it easier for them "to display that they are stupid" which is the paraphrase for your "correction." I was using "their stupid" as a replacement for "their stupidity." I'm making use of a language in a slightly non-standard way, as a conscious decision.

Thanks, though.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

Their stupid. I deliberately used a non-standard nominalization of "stupid" in this instance.

Kind of like "teh stupid! it burns," or other similar phrasing you could find out there on the intertubes.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Anonymous Coward]

The internet just makes it easier and faster for morons to display their stupid.

Their what?

"Their", stupid!

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Anonymous Coward]

The internet just makes it easier and faster for morons to display their stupid.

Exactly.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Anonymous Coward]

so now you could but on your resume tried to create a meme, epic fail?

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[eltaco]

isn't it fun how the first tier of grammar nazis falls flat on their faces, when confronted with creative writing? I guess it's indicative, that most grammar nazis are in it for the trolling and catching-out of others, not for their love for (the english) language or worrying forbode of the sms-generation's lack of motivation to spell properly.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Doctor Faustus]

How do you blame technology for some jackass failing to take his civic responsibility seriously?
This is people who *are* taking their civic responsibility seriously; they are doing more than they're required to. They may not be taking the rules of how juries are supposed to behave seriously, but those rules don't deserve to be respected.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[geekoid]

A stainless steel jackass?

for those that don't get it, it's a twist on this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stainless_Steel_Rat

A decent fun set of books.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Cro Magnon]

Meh! First we had people verbing nouns. Now we have them nouning adjectives.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

Exactly, indeed.

Still, at least it's amusing when I deliberately make a word choice (such as selecting a non-standard nominalization of "stupid"), as I did in my original post, and stupid people assume it's a spelling mistake.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Keith_Beef]

'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone,' it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.' 'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.'

If you want to communicate effectively with me, you need to use mutually intelligible language. If we both understand what is termed "non-standard English", then OK, it works, so long as we both understand it.

You can transpose letters here and there for sarcasm or humour, such as writing "thnaks" instead of "thanks" and I'll understand perfectly well.

If you start using the word "stupid" to stand for "stupidity", I'll probably not get the message you're trying to transmit.

If you go too far, I may even believe the very opposite of what you are trying to tell me, with possibly costly or dangerous consequences.

K.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[smoker2]

Because of course, we are all fucking psychic !
It strikes me that you have nothing worth saying, so you twist the words to hide the fact.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[AK Marc]

What is a jurors civic duty? To serve justice, or to serve the court? If you declare that the court is more important than being right or serving justice, then yes, they are not taking their duties seriously. But if you are in a case where there are two experts, one from each side, and their testamony conflicts, who do you believe? The one that sounded best in court, or the one that all the information you can find agrees with (not that those are exclusive features)? Why is it wrong to try to seek external validation for conflicting testamony? In a drunk driving case I was instructed that "if someone demonstrates horizontal gaze nystagmus, then they must be drunk." No one ever said otherwise. And so am, I to take as medical fact that this is a condition that a cop can judge on the side of the road at night easily, and that it is necessarily an indication of drunkenness that exceeds the legal limit? I have no idea. I've never bothered to look it up. However, that there is some medical condition that's easy to see and nearly 100% accuracy that will let you know when someone is over the legal limit and can't present when someone isn't is a convneience that sounds a little too convenient.

Ever read a newspaper article about something you are intimately familiar with? I've been quoted in the newspaper before. Never did they get a single word right. To their credit, they got the idea I was trying to convey, and managed to spell my name right most of the time, but to claim a quote and be completly wrong on the words is something only I would know. And the technical stories. I have a good idea on tech. And they simplify to the point of understanding for someone completely unfamiliar, but that often is past the point of accuracy. So they tell falsehoods because it gives the impression they want to convey. That's what they do in court. I'd rather be told the truth, and if I can't understand it, then I'd want it explained. To have it dumbed down so that I can understand something unfamiliar in the first pass can make it inaccurate. And sometimes those details are the ones that are important in court cases.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

It strikes me that you have nothing worth saying, so you twist the words to hide the fact.

Presumably we ought to respect you coming right out and flaunting the fact you've got nothing worth saying?

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

The fact that you find my explanation convoluted says far more about your capabilities than it does about my explanation.

But feel free to think as you like, or are able.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Anonymous Coward]

He's just displaying his stupid.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[dubbreak]

With technology, he's a more efficient jackass.

Yep. Hybrid jackasses. Way more efficient. We're talking 50mpg+ while your classic jackass is lucky to get 12mpg.

Of course the new jackasses just don't sound the same and most don't find them as entertaining.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[tompeach]

and 'their' was me thinking you'd made an amusingly ironic typo, thanks for clearing it up.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[scribblej]

It's a genuine disconnect between the language and the speakers!

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[sabs]

You could said "They're stupid", or "Their Stupidity".

But "Their Stupid", just makes you look like an idiot who can't spell.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Ironica]

You know, someone can be a total asshole to everyone he knows, and *still* be innocent. But finding out what his ex and his former employer and his kids say about him on the internet might, just *might*, prejudice a jury against him.

You think those rules don't deserve to be respected? I hope you don't actually end up on a jury.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Ironica]

FTR, while I thought it statistically likely that the post was a grammar-o (not really a typo, exactly), I recognized that it might have been a deliberate decision to use the word "stupid" as a noun and include the possessive ahead of it. Didn't confuse me in the slightest.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Ironica]

Honestly, this sub-thread is making me wonder if Google is testing out a new grammar-checker by making a /. grammar troll bot.

Don't feel too bad. I got it the first time.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Reality Master 201]

You could said "They're stupid", or "Their Stupidity".

But "Their Stupid", just makes you look like an idiot who can't spell.

If you're going to pick on my spelling or word choice, you ought to proofread your post first.
Leaving out the auxiliary verb makes you look like an idiot who likes to take other people to task for stuff he doesn't fully grasp.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Doctor Faustus]

I'm not likely to ever be on a criminal jury. If the jury can't ask questions, see complete court transcripts, do their own research and call witnesses, I'm usually going to consider that to be reasonable doubt. No prosecutor would ever let me on.

And yes, I see the point about prejudicing jurors, but I see that as less of a problem than lawyers not covering everything they should have.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Anonymous Coward]

Generally, taking license with the language is something that's earned. When a well-known poster does it, the reader can know from past experience that the poster has command of the English language and is deliberately using a perversion of it for effect. You can also garner that level of respect if the post is lengthy and otherwise flawless. Failing that, if you are going to post a 2-line comment like you did, you may want to use quotes around the word you're intentionally misusing, especially when the misuse of the word could be construed as using the word correctly and messing up a different word (i.e. either replacing "stupid" with "stupidity" or replacing "their" with "they're" would make your sentence make sense.)

Assuming that people will realize your command of the English language from a 2-line post rather than assuming that you've made an error, either unintentionally or out of ignorance is somewhat risky. It's similar to using sarcasm in posts. It's far too easy to read something you've written and assume that the sarcasm is obvious when it's anything but to people who don't know you and don't have a history of reading your work to draw from when interpreting what you write. Likewise, it's far too easy to read your initial comment and assume that you're like the multitude of idiots that tend to drown out insightful posts by posting semi-illiterate drivel.

So basically, while your responses to the responses to your original post have shown that you were intentionally using the words you chose, calling people stupid for not realizing that isn't fair if you haven't given them a reason to assume otherwise. Because anyone who's spent any considerable amount of time reading posts on Slashdot knows that assuming someone is intelligent and in command of the English language means being wrong more frequently than you are right.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[smellotron]

isn't it fun how the first tier of grammar nazis falls flat on their faces, when confronted with creative writing?

That's probably because creative usage of language is far outweighed by mistakes, and Occam's Razor applies. The logical response is to assume a mistake was made, until the author indicates otherwise (or demonstrates mastery of the language, as would be the case with established writers).

So, go ahead and be creative; but don't act astonished when people just think you're being stupidly.

Re:It's not the internet - it's morons

[Dragoness Eclectic]

I was on a federal jury once. I kept asking the judge for clarification about points of the law that the suspect was being tried under that I didn't understand (which you are fully entitled to do, btw--judge said so in his instructions). The judge made me jury foreman because I kept asking him questions.

I guess he figured I wasn't afraid to talk to the judge.

Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

allow informational sites and searches to be counted as admissable

Re:Solution

[Shakrai]

allow informational sites and searches to be counted as admissable

That's a great idea! So, the next time I stand accused of murder, I'll simply edit my Wikipedia page to say "Shakrai did not commit this crime" and rest easy in the knowledge that my acquittal will follow soon thereafter. Think of all the money I can save on defense attorneys now ;)

Re:Solution

[SaDan]

That's the job of the prosecutor and defendant. They gather the info to make the case.

Re:Solution

[DrLang21]

And 20 minutes later some other jackass will edit it to read "Shakrai did not commit this crime. He did however murder and molest (in that order) 20 children."

Re:Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll simply edit my Wikipedia page to say "Shakrai did not commit this crime"

[citation needed]

Re:Solution

[morgan_greywolf]

I know you're joking, but I'm confused by the wording of the AC you're replying to. 'Admissable' in this context usually implies 'Admissable as evidence'.

1) I fail to see how making those searches admissable would solve anything.
2) Information sites and searches are already counted as admissable, but not in the way you think: someone recently convicted of murder in Florida got busted by searching for "how to poison someone" or something like that. The wording of the search and results exactly matched the method the killer used in the murder.

Re:Solution

[tsstahl]

OMG, you figured out step 2!!!

I genuflect before you, oh Prophet of profit.

Just bar access.

[Jane Q. Public]

It's easy to do, and easy to explain. There really should not be any problem here. If it is pissing off judges, then those judges did not explain the rules properly.

Re:Just bar access.

[danwesnor]

You're going on the assumption that everybody always follows the rules. If they did, we wouldn't need judges or juries (at least for criminal cases).

Re:Just bar access.

[SaDan]

The last time I was part of a jury, we were required to give up cell phones and PDAs while we were in trial and deliberating. We got our phones back when we went on lunch break and after we were dismissed for the day

Honestly, it made sense. Nothing outside the courtroom should influence your decision in court.

Internet Minstrals on the Rise?

[Anonymous Coward]

...or so I thought.

can't fight this, just control it

[roman_mir]

It's not going to be possible to fight this, instead the system should attempt at controlling this by allowing information to the jury but in a way, that is controlled.

So you want to see Google Maps? Well, that's great, but how do you know when the pictures where taken that you are looking at? You don't know, so understand that what is on the picture you are looking at can be totally different from what is the reality right now.

So the controlling feature would be to confirm the date and time, when this particular Google Map picture was taken. Jury should be controlled in this way: it should be explained to them, that information on the internet is not completely reliable (sometimes it is completely unreliable), that 'facts' on the internet are just words/pictures/sounds/videos of something that could have been changed by chance or doctored on purpose.

Basically it should be allowed for the jury to see the information but with a caveat, that this information is only a hearsay.

Re:can't fight this, just control it

[NeoSkandranon]

Won't work. If they are even allowed to see it, it will color judgment.

Some jurors may even "decide" that the internet available info "seems right to them" as opposed to admitted evidence.

Re:can't fight this, just control it

[DrLang21]

I don't think any of this is new. The difference is that technology makes it a lot easier to notice. Any outside information on a trial not presented in court will influence the jury in some way, some more extreme than others. I think the only real way to combat this is to impose stiff fines on jurors who cause a mistrial by blatantly ignoring the court order to no access this information during the trial.

Re:can't fight this, just control it

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, because people never act on hearsay.

Let me tell you about this dude named Jesus...

A Jury Of Our Peers

[aquatone282]

God help us all.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Shakrai]

I dunno. Jury of our peers > the alternatives.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Rog-Mahal]

Hmm, so instead of peers we could have: Jury of our seeds, Jury of our leechers, Jury of our users, or worst of all, Jury of our superusers. Cue XKCD joke "sudo make me a sandwich".

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Ethanol-fueled]

Depends on the venue. It would make sense that you'd want to be tried in the most liberal venue you can get.

Remember John Allan Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo? Choice quote from the Wikipedia:

...the primary reason for extraditing the two suspects from Maryland...to Virginia, was the differences in how the two states deal with the death penalty. While the death penalty is allowed in Maryland, it is only applied to persons who were adults at the time of their crimes, whereas Virginia had also allowed the death penalty for offenders who had been juveniles when their crimes were committed.

But yeah, if most of my peers watched American Idol and Rush Limbaugh I'd be shittin' bricks too.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Anonymous Coward]

MY peers are pretty smart. Most of the population are not my peers. In anything.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[DrLang21]

A jury of our peers has one of three possible outcomes today.
1. Shield from a judge's political agenda. 2. Hanging from an unreasonable outraged mob (common when accused of a crime against a child)
3. In highly rare cases of jury rebellion, jury nullification.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[xaositects]

Hmm, so instead of peers we could have: Jury of our seeds, Jury of our leechers, Jury of our users, or worst of all, Jury of our superusers. Cue XKCD joke "sudo make me a sandwich".

or this XKCD comic.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Anonymous Coward]

[citation needed]

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Richard_at_work]

Sometimes, thats not quite true - one of the big problems we are having with the British Parliamentary system at the moment is the House of Commons (the elected part) pushing through draconian, far reaching legislation which most of the population is against, and the House of Lords (the unelected part) rightfully shooting that legislation down.

Does it count as irony when the people you depend on in a democratic country were not picked democratically?

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Anonymous Coward]

The original intention of the word peers in 'Jury of your Peers' was your betters. Don't forget this was the English ruling class bowing to pressure from peasants...

So if that were still true, your peers would probably not have a telly and would be far too busy shooting wildlife for fun...

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Shakrai]

Does it count as irony when the people you depend on in a democratic country were not picked democratically?

Well I can't speak for the British but in the US the Supreme Court isn't elected. The Senate wasn't elected originally until some genius got the bright idea that we needed more "democracy". Checks and balances don't always have to be democratically elected. In fact if you are trying to check against the tyranny of the majority it's obviously better if they aren't.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[tjstork]

. Don't forget this was the English ruling class bowing to pressure from peasants...

Except that, they weren't peasants... the instigators of the American Revolution were all fairly wealthy men by their day. Indeed, Samuel Adams and John Adams were among the richest businessmen in the world at that time. The American revolution was a bunch of rich people throwing off a monarchy so they could get richer, and they got the "peasants" to go along by doling out incredible amounts of land to everyone.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Anonymous Coward]

A jury of our peers means that there will be much resetting of connections.

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're pinning your hopes on fairy tales, you've got bigger things to worry about than a jury that tries to inform itself when the court withholds information. (For what it's worth, I've experienced the withholding. It's bloody annoying when the lawyers don't provide the jury with information *that they have* that's important to making a decision.)

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[dodobh]

Your peers need to be Slashdot readers ;).

Re:A Jury Of Our Peers

[Dragoness Eclectic]

Er, no. Having read David McCullough's rather fascinating biography of John Adams, I am aware that he was pretty much a middle-class lawyer. Thomas Jefferson was a big land-owner--massively in debt all the time. George Washington was definitely a wealthy landowner, unlike many of his plantation-owning peers who were head-over-heels in debt like Jefferson--because Washington was quite smart about not living beyond his means and making sure his land actually earned money.

The American Revolution was a bunch of American upper-middle-class businessmen throwing off the monarchy and the laws enacted by Parliment to protect British mercantile interests at the expense of American mercantile interests. People who had worked hard to make a success of themselves in the Colonies rather justifiably didn't see why they should be impoverished by unfair laws designed to make rich manufacturers back in England still richer.

Hmm...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

While I don't think that the rules of evidence are beyond reproach(in particular, I've always found it weird that jurors can't ask questions), having people knocking around on the internet during the trial seems like an abjectly terrible idea.

With all the techniques and technologies developed for things like search engine optimization, various flavors of astroturfing, and the like, it would be pretty trivial to "seed" the internet with information calculated to specifically influence a jury one way or the other. Having to deal with parties being either crucified or beatified by the press is bad enough, having "objective" information being fed directly to the jurors by interested parties would be even worse.

It would be nice if there were a mechanism for jurors to request, and obtain, information they believe to be relevant("We are deciding a traffic case, could we get a street map and some pictures of the area in the jury room"); but hitting wikipedia on your phone isn't it.

Re:Hmm...

[Ares]

imho, its not so weird that jurors can't ask questions (on trial juries at least; grand juries are different beasts altogether). in a criminal trial the prosecution must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty. if i as a juror had questions by the time deliberations came around, that's a huge red flag to me that the prosecutor didn't prove his case, and instilled reasonable doubt in me.

Re:Hmm...

[dexmachina]

It would be nice if there were a mechanism for jurors to request, and obtain, information they believe to be relevant("We are deciding a traffic case, could we get a street map and some pictures of the area in the jury room"); but hitting wikipedia on your phone isn't it.

Even that wouldn't fly. If there was information to be gained that could influence the jurors' judment, then the defense or prosecution should have presented them during the case. The idea of "admissible evidence" is extremely important, and prevents all kinds of abuses that would otherwise occur. So, the jury gets what the judge says they can have, and what the lawyers think is pertinent to their case. Jurors aren't investigators. It isn't their job to actively try to "find the facts", regardless of whether or not the information has been vetted first. They listen, and decide.

That's the fundamental problem here, and that's why I think all the people saying things like "the courts just need to get with the times" are wrong (I know you said you're against the whole internet P.I. thing, I'm just segueing now). I really don't believe this is case of old ways of doing things that have to catch up with modern technology. This is no different then the practice of sequestering in high profile cases where access to the media could influence a juror. The only difference is that, because of the scope of the internet, a trial or a defendent doesn't have to be famous in order to get information with it. If anything, I think the old rules need to be made more rigorous now that it's so much easier for outside influence to affect a juror.

Re:Hmm...

[Quothz]

While I don't think that the rules of evidence are beyond reproach(in particular, I've always found it weird that jurors can't ask questions)

In some states, jurors can ask questions, in writing, through the judge. Whether the questions are posed to witnesses is at the judge's discretion. (Naturally, in any state jurors may ask the judge questions to clarify their instructions, but that's not what you meant.)

Re:Hmm...

[spinninggears]

Well, actually jurors can ask questions. I have done it, and it changed the course of the trial. The judge does not have to allow the question though, and in my case, a stern lecture was administered.

Re:Hmm...

[Rich0]

Frankly, I think half the problem is that the legal system resents the fact that jurors even exist.

Jurors should have the right to question every witness. They should also have the right to some form of discovery (within the limits of the 5th ammendment) - so that if evidence or testimony wasn't provided they can at least know what they're missing.

It seems like the goal of the courts is to essentially decide the case in motions and then present the jury with a precisely-determined picture so that they can reach the pre-determined conclusion. For "minor" offenses you aren't even entited to a jury trial even though almost any civil lawsuit qualifies for one. Sue somebody for $10k and you are guaranteed a jury trial. Get accused of 5 counts of a crime that carries a 4 month prison term and you aren't. That sure makes sense...

Also - I'd like to see courts less involved in a number of things they tend to get involved with. That would probably get rid of a number of problems people complain about with regard to "uneducated" juries.

Re:Hmm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Fine, I'll listen, then decide, and if I figure out that there's any pertinent facts that you're not telling me I'll be deciding that I'm not qualified ot decide and stall until I get discharged.

Re:Hmm...

[Otto]

So, in your view, a guilty person should be allowed to go free because the prosecutor is incompetent? Or an innocent man should be convicted because the defense attorney is an idiot?

The purpose of the trial should be to determine the truth. The fact that it's set up entirely differently is the problem with the system. The system is biased and unfair.

The only defense against that system is the right of the jury to vote however they want and not have to explain their reasoning. But it's a minor thing, especially when the system itself controls all their inputs.

There ought to be a better way.

Re:Hmm...

[Otto]

Jurors aren't investigators. It isn't their job to actively try to "find the facts", regardless of whether or not the information has been vetted first. They listen, and decide.

That is the fundamental problem with the system. It should be their job to seek the truth. To relegate the jury to the idea of merely a decision-making machine is to eliminate all judgment and to remove the whole human-factor from the equation. It makes the court system into nothing more than a farce.

The fact that the court system is failing because of the wider availability of information only proves that.

Re:Hmm...

[pjt33]

It isn't their job to actively try to "find the facts", regardless of whether or not the information has been vetted first.

No, but it is their job to determine the facts, and if they believe that there is information which hasn't been supplied to them and which would assist then they should be within their rights (and AIUI are in English courts, at least) to say to the judge, "We'd like a briefing on X." The judge can then determine whether it's a legal and reasonable request or not.

Re:Hmm...

[Ironica]

That's the fundamental problem here, and that's why I think all the people saying things like "the courts just need to get with the times" are wrong (I know you said you're against the whole internet P.I. thing, I'm just segueing now). I really don't believe this is case of old ways of doing things that have to catch up with modern technology.

I generally agree with your point, but I think there is a tech lag issue here too. I think that attorneys presenting cases need to get used to the idea that jurors are going to use the Internet. They're going to have to trust that *most* jurors will understand the rules and abide by them... but they also need to understand that even when you TRY to do this, you can screw up.

So... they need to be doing *daily* searches for info that pertains to their case. They need to know what people are likely to see, whether they're looking for it or not. If Google News picks up a story about an incident in a small town where things like this just never happen, and that incident *happens* to be similar to your case, with accompanying discussion of relevant law etc., you NEED TO KNOW that the jurors may have run across it. Then you need to tell the judge.

Judges, for their part, need to also be aware of the scope of information that one is likely to encounter if they use the internet regularly. That way, they can better instruct juries on how to maintain their integrity, and can better understand information that attorneys bring to them about internet-related information that may be prejudicial to the case.

I think the issue here is that, while people understand newspapers and library research as things that can prejudice a juror, we don't yet understand how the internet can do so, and the implications are different.

For example, it was raised in reference to the Twitter case that, while the juror claims not to have read any feedback on his tweets, the micro-fame gained from the interface may have influenced how he voted in the deliberation room. That's something that attorneys and judges need to be aware of, and need to account for in juror selection and instruction. Perhaps one of the standard questions should be "Do you blog regularly? About what?"

Sooo?

[Uchiha]

This is only a problem if they look up OJ SIMPSON and use guiltyguiltyguilty.com as there reference.

How is using the net any different than reading a newspaper or hearing people talk about it in the subway. They're suppose to pick a juror based on his unbiased disposition, not his tech ability.

So change the rules

[interiot]

They are required to reach a verdict based on only the facts the judge has decided are admissible, and they are not supposed to see evidence that has been excluded as prejudicial. ... the rules of evidence, developed over hundreds of years of jurisprudence, are there to ensure that the facts that go before a jury have been subjected to scrutiny and challenge from both sides

Honestly, this is another "information wants to be free" issue. I can understand asking jurors to not Google about the specific people involved in the case, but to prevent them from looking up general information is absurd. If I was in a jury, I'd be very interested in the relevant case law.

It's the age of the Internet, you can't block people off from information any longer.

Re:So change the rules

[Shakrai]

If I was in a jury, I'd be very interested in the relevant case law.

The problem is that as a member of the jury it isn't your job to look at the case law. You are supposed to be a finder of fact, i.e: did the defendant commit this act. It's up to the judge to review the case law and if he does a piss-poor job of it then the defendant has grounds for appeal.

you can't block people off from information any longer.

Actually if they wanted to they could.

Re:So change the rules

[SaDan]

The problem is you, the typical juror, are not a lawyer.

It's one thing to have access to information, and another to be able to apply that information correctly.

Re:So change the rules

[N3Roaster]

If I was in a jury, I'd be very interested in the relevant case law.

Last time I was on a jury, we got a printout of that information. I don't know if that's normal or not, but it was certainly useful.

Re:So change the rules

[davmoo]

I'd be very interested in the relevant case law

You can be interested all you want. But you cannot base your verdict on what you think about case law. All you are allowed to base a verdict on is the information presented in the courtroom.

As for blocking people off from "information" while on jury duty, the threat of a few days in jail if caught will take care of that.

All parties in a court action, whether it be civil or criminal, deserve a fair, impartial, and unbiased jury. Were it you in the courtroom I'm sure you'd demand no less for yourself. And I'd also be willing to bet that were I serving on your jury, you'd prefer I not get my information about you and your case from Wikipedia.

Re:So change the rules

[KenSeymour]

If you were a juror, you would be expressly told by the judge NOT to do your own research.

There is nothing wrong with looking stuff up after the trial is over.

Can you imagine a jury room with 12 people all saying "Well according to MY research . . ."

Re:So change the rules

[dexmachina]

The problem is it's a very fuzzy line between what's general enough, and what's to specific to the case at hand. If there there was relevant case law that could influence the jurors one way or another, it should have been presented during the case. It's not their job to search out helpful little tidbits. And from a purely practical standpoint, if you allow jurors internet access but say they can only access certain kinds of information, cases would become endlessly bogged down with calls for a mistrial as lawyers try to argue why such-and-such bit of info that was obtained by juror x hit a little too close to home.

Re:So change the rules

[DragonWriter]

Honestly, this is another "information wants to be free" issue. I can understand asking jurors to not Google about the specific people involved in the case, but to prevent them from looking up general information is absurd. If I was in a jury, I'd be very interested in the relevant case law.

The jury isn't the trier of law, that's the judge's job. The jury is the trier of fact. Any application of case law independently by a juror, wherever they derived the knowledge and however correct it is, would be misconduct. The jury is to determine the facts, not to apply their own understanding of the law. This is important, because the judge articulates and applies the law, and that articulation is subject to review on appeal. A silent, unexplained application of law by a juror (and, a fortiori, multiple of them by different jurors) cannot be effectively reviewed on appeal because no one knows what it is. The deference given to the juries decision on points of fact (it being overruled on appeal only if the evidence could not reasonably support the conclusion found) is entirely dependent on the premise that the jury is just following the instructions they are given and determining the facts in accordance with those.

That's not to say the rules couldn't be changed, but these aren't just peripheral rules -- to change the rules on what jurors can do upends a lot of the fundamental principles of the jury system. (And that's only dealing with the aspect of the trier of fact vs. trier of law role; then there is the whole question of how they perform the role of trier of fact, and the issue of excluded evidence, which often directly involves the Constitutional rights of the people in court, and Constitutional limits on powers of government.

It's the age of the Internet, you can't block people off from information any longer.

To an extent, the rise in mistrials is a result of it being easier to detect the kinds of violations that people engage in. It's a lot easier for a party to a case to find out and bring to a judge's attention juror misconduct that consists of or is announced in internet postings than when its just talked about around a watercooler.

Re:So change the rules

[Attila Dimedici]

The problem with this is that there is information that is NOT allowed to be used by the jury to make a decision. Some of that information is evidence that was improperly obtained (e.g., no search warrant), some of it is information that is deemed prejudicial (e.g., previously charged with a crime). This is information that it has been decided by the legal system over the years would interfere with the defendant receiving a fair trial.

Re:So change the rules

[Thiez]

Are you suggesting information about the law be kept from jurors, lest they misapply it?

Re:So change the rules

[Archangel Michael]

Actually, the jury has a right to nullify even the law. If the law itself is unjust, the jury has a right to nullify even the law.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification

The jury has the right to judge both the law as well as the fact in controversy. - John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States

Re:So change the rules

[SaDan]

From my experience as a juror, the law as it pertains to the case is explained in detail by the judge.

You are free to ask the judge questions if there is any issue that is not clear to you as a juror.

Re:So change the rules

[Creepy Crawler]

Thats not how it works. Here in Indiana, they give you a multi-page printout with the basic rules of being a juror.

The last 3 pages are a simple checklist of the minimum requirements to find somebody guilty of a certain charge. Of course, the "Simple checklist" states the very high minimums of the said law.

Re:So change the rules

[Eric in SF]

Jury Nullification. You are under no legal order to render your personal verdict using a certain set of facts. Life experience cannot be erased from one's memory and those experience I guarantee have not been subject to the rigors of a cross-examination.

Re:So change the rules

[Cro Magnon]

And I'd also be willing to bet that were I serving on your jury, you'd prefer I not get my information about you and your case from Wikipedia

It wouldn't bother me if you got the info from Wikipedia - as long as I got to edit it first.

Re:So change the rules

[bug]

That is not entirely true. Jury nullification occurs when a jury makes a decision on a point of law (i.e., that the law itself should not be enforced). Judges have done everything in their power to limit jury nullification, but that power does still exist.

Re:So change the rules

[raddan]

The jury is to determine the facts, not to apply their own understanding of the law.

This is incorrect. See this post.

Choice quote from Wikipedia article: "The jury has the right to judge both the law as well as the fact in controversy." -- John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States

Re:So change the rules

[DragonWriter]

That is not entirely true. Jury nullification occurs when a jury makes a decision on a point of law (i.e., that the law itself should not be enforced).

That jury nullification exists as a de facto power is a very different thing than whether or not it is proper. It certainly is the case that the jury can decide the fact questions presented to it on any basis it chooses, including improper ones. Its a bit more debatable whether jury nullification is proper, but in any case jury nullification is not a finding on what the law is, it is a finding that the law should not be applied at all and that the defendant should be let off notwithstanding the law.

Inasmuch as jury nullification is a desirable power of juries (whether or not technically a proper one), I would say that independent, out-of-court investigation, whose contents are not revealed completely to the parties, by jurors in support of it is equally problematic as such investigation in the jury's role as trier of fact, for the same reason: it brings arguments into the jury deliberations that have not been presented to the parties to the case and which the parties whose interests are harmed have no opportunity to rebut.

 

Re:So change the rules

[Otto]

You can be interested all you want. But you cannot base your verdict on what you think about case law.

Of course you can. If the law is wrong, then it is the jury's duty to decide that as well.

The jury has the right to judge the merits of the law as well as the facts at hand. And any judge or lawyer that tells you otherwise is flat-out lying to you.

Re:So change the rules

[Rich0]

I would say that independent, out-of-court investigation, whose contents are not revealed completely to the parties, by jurors in support of it is equally problematic as such investigation in the jury's role as trier of fact, for the same reason: it brings arguments into the jury deliberations that have not been presented to the parties to the case and which the parties whose interests are harmed have no opportunity to rebut.

I can see the logic in this argument.

However, might a better solution be to have the parties present their arguments (as is currently done). Then the jury will elect a foreman who will moderate an inquiry where the jury can question the parties and any witnesses. After the inquiry the parties would be able to make an abbreviated statement. Further inquirys might come up during deliberation much as juries currently request the readback of testimony and clarifications from the judge/etc.

I take moral issue with the idea that jurors should be expected to make a judgement in the absence of facts where the juror is quite conscious that their judgement will have a huge impact on the lives of the accused and/or his past and future victims. If any juror wants to know a little more they should be able to ask. In most states jurors cannot question anybody other than the judge, and the only information they're going to get is a clarification of the law or a read-back of testimony.

Re:So change the rules

[DragonWriter]

However, might a better solution be to have the parties present their arguments (as is currently done). Then the jury will elect a foreman who will moderate an inquiry where the jury can question the parties and any witnesses. After the inquiry the parties would be able to make an abbreviated statement. Further inquirys might come up during deliberation much as juries currently request the readback of testimony and clarifications from the judge/etc.

Juries can already, in some cases, direct requests for information to the parties through the judge (as any such inquiry does involve issues of law as to its appropriateness, the judge does act as a filter.) I certainly don't see any fundamental problem with this being a more generally-available option. What is problematic is independent investigation which brings material into the decision that is neither filtered for legal appropriateness (such as violation of rights of the parties in presenting the evidence, which is particularly an issue, and one of Constitutional character, in criminal trials) nor subject to rebuttal by the parties, which is what is producing the "internet-related" mistrials currently happening.

Re:So change the rules

[Ironica]

If I was in a jury, I'd be very interested in the relevant case law.

Good! That means you'll be paying close attention when the attorneys and judge present that information to you. After all, it's up to them to decide what is relevant to the case... your job is to understand the law in the context of the facts of the case they've presented.

Re:So change the rules

[Ironica]

Any application of case law independently by a juror, wherever they derived the knowledge and however correct it is, would be misconduct.

PP well explains the legal foundation for that, but let me take a stab at explaining the practical foundation.

When a lawyer is deciding how to make their case, they will look at *all* the case law that might be relevant. Then, they decide what helps their case, and what doesn't. They also decide what helps the opposite side's case, so they can figure out how to refute it. They do this with all the training and knowledge they've accumulated about how law works.

Then they get into the courtroom. They present their case, including references to precedents which help their case. The other side does the same, and then they get to respond to each other.

It's that last part that is the most important to this issue. Attorneys get to HEAR what case law is being raised by the other side, and RESPOND to how it pertains to the case at hand. If you go and find some other piece of case law that you believe is relevant, whether or not it actually is, the attorneys for each side get no opportunity to present *facts* of their case that may reflect on how that case law is applied. If it's not relevant for some minor technical reason (perhaps due to some *other* case law that you didn't find in your search), they can't tell you that. If there's some piece of evidence that was beyond the scope of the case as presented, but would have addressed that point of case law, you'll never know about it.

That's why the jury is limited to using what is presented to them in deciding the verdict. It's important that EVERYONE be going off the same set of relevant law and facts.

Re:So change the rules

[Anonymous Coward]

Please look up "Jury Nullification"

Re:So change the rules

[BarefootClown]

The jury isn't the trier of law, that's the judge's job. The jury is the trier of fact.

"It is presumed, that juries are the best judges of facts; it is, on the other hand, presumed that courts are the best judges of law. But still both objects are within your power of decision... you [juries] have a right to take it upon yourselves to judge of both, and to determine the law as well as the fact in controversy."
State Of Georgia v. Brailsford, 3 U.S. 1,4 (1794), written by Chief Justice John Jay (emphasis added).

Re:So change the rules

[Atlantis-Rising]

It only exists because it isn't allowed to punish jurors for the decision they arrived at.

However, if the Judge gets any inkling you believe in jury nullification, you'll be kicked out of the jury pool so fast your head will spin.

Jury nullification is a systemic abomination, merely a quirk of the way the system works.

Re:So change the rules

[drmerope]

The jury isn't the trier of law, that's the judge's job. The jury is the trier of fact. Any application of case law independently by a juror, wherever they derived the knowledge and however correct it is, would be misconduct.

Arrogant poppycock. Trial-by-jury is a constitutionally protected right, which means that we need to look to the common-law to determine what that means. In so much as legislatures and judges have arrogated the common-law meaning, they've breached their legal authority.

"It is presumed, that juries are the best judges of facts; it is, on the other hand, presumed that courts are the best judges of law. But still both objects are within your power of decision... [jurors] have a right to take it upon [themselves] to be the judge of both, and to determine the law as well as the fact in controversy". State Of Georgia v. Brailsford, 3 U.S. 1,4 (1794)

"It is not only his right but also his duty... to find the verdict according to his own best understanding, judgment, and conscience, though in direct opposition to the direction of the court." - John Adams

Re:So change the rules

[DragonWriter]

Trial-by-jury is a constitutionally protected right

True in criminal cases, and in many federal civil cases, otherwise, not.

which means that we need to look to the common-law to determine what that means

False. "X is a constitutionally protected right" does not imply "we need to look to the common-law to determine what X means". In the case of jury trial, the only Constitutional mandate to look to the common law is in the review of facts tried by jury (Amendment VII). The common law, of course, is one source looked to for meanings of terms in the Constitution (particularly the original text and the Bill of Rights), but is not on its own dispositive; context and interaction with other terms in the Constitution is also relevant, as other other factors.

In so much as legislatures and judges have arrogated the common-law meaning, they've breached their legal authority.

The essential evolution in the United States limiting the jury to the role of trier of fact except for the unquestioned power (and debatable right) of nullification (which is generally understood as limited to criminal cases and, one should note, is not, even there, the same as being the ultimate arbiter of law, since it can operate in only one direction from the law as articulated by the judge) is essential to protecting other Constitutional rights of those before the court, as, even moreso, is the limitation of the jury to acting on material subject to confrontation in court, even when the jury is assumed to have an inherent right to nullification.

Re:So change the rules

[mrsteele]

This comes up in /. more than it ever does in real life. Overall, modern courts do not support this idea, and I wish it would stop being so prominent here. It's simply bad advice. It's a good way to get tossed off a jury, and that's about it.

I think...

[JustShootMe]

This is exposing a systemic problem with the court system. The whole thing is dependent on juries knowing exactly what the lawyers for both sides, and the judge, want them to know, and no more. But there's no real way to enforce that, and there never has been.

It is in the interest of both lawyers to have the most ignorant, moldable, and frankly stupid, set of jurors that they can possibly find. Which I guess makes sense because that's certainly "peers" of most criminals...

That's not to say I would go out and look for information in contravention of a judge's instructions (I have jury duty next week and it'd be stupid not to make that clear) but that doesn't mean I think the rules themselves aren't kind of unreasonable. Last I checked I was still allowed an opinion.

Sorry if this comment's a bit disjointed, it's 7:30 AM and I haven't had my shower yet ;)

Re:I think...

[illegalcortex]

I have to chime in on this one. To paraphrase Churchill, trial by a jury of your peers is the worst form of justice except all the others that have been tried.

Re:I think...

[Ironica]

It is in the interest of both lawyers to have the most ignorant, moldable, and frankly stupid, set of jurors that they can possibly find.

If they have a bad case. But a good lawyer with a good case wants SMART jurors. I was on such a jury; after the case was over, one of the attorneys for one of the respondents (civil case) mentioned that they wanted the smartest jury they could muster, because they KNEW the case was bunk. And they were right, too... we told the plaintiff's attorney afterward, "You sued the wrong doctor!"

So...

[thered2001]

...an educated jury is a havoc-wreaking one? How is this any different than going to a library and looking up info after court? (Other than 'instant' is easier and that the Interweb is full of lies and damned lies.)

Re:So...

[Domint]

the Interweb is full of lies and damned lies.

So is the Library. I don't see why I should put any more faith in the written words of an anonymous stranger simply because it is on paper rather than on my screen. Books can be (and often are) just as biased or distorted as anything found on the 'Interweb'.

Re:So...

[abigsmurf]

Because people are not experts on a subject matter.

It's like self diagnosis. If you look up your symptoms you could find that you have a mild cold, You could also discover that you 'have' any number of exotic deadly diseases. It takes a trained doctor to be able to ask the right quests and examine you and narrow it down to the most likely disease.

Lawyers and judges are skilled at knowing what is and isn't relevant to a case, at knowing how to get vital information from an expert. If you've looked up information that has been left out of a case, there may be a reason it's been left out. The defence might have chosen to leave out a piece of evidence you think would prove innocence deliberately because it carries unforeseen implications.

If you look at someone accused of murder and look up that he has previous convictions for violent assault, that would make it seem more likely he was a murderer. However a judge may view that the assault charges were simple drunken brawls but the murder was planned, cold and calculated. The drunken brawls aren't related enough to the present case to justify the impact they'd have on the jury.

Re:So...

[illegalcortex]

How is this any different than going to a library and looking up info after court?

Well, because you don't have to go to a library. And you don't have to look it up. And you don't have to wait until after court. But other than that, it's identical!

Re:So...

[jggimi]

In the only criminal case I've sat on (as Juror #7), during the post-trial discussion with the Judge, we jurors asked, "Did the defendant have a prior criminal record?"

The judge answered, "Just like all of you ... I don't know. I prefer to adjudicate without that knowledge, as I believe that makes me more impartial. A defendant's criminal record is a key component of sentencing, so I will have that information when the defendant appears before me for sentencing."

I never did find out what the sentence was.

Re:So...

[The Moof]

Lawyers and judges are skilled at knowing what is and isn't relevant to a case.

They're also quite skilled at distorting truth and presenting it in a way that manipulates and misleads a jury to get their desired results.

Re:So...

[Anonymous Coward]

A while back I had some pain near my groin/abdomen. I told work I was going to the doc, but instead went home and just googled and searched medical sites. I thought I had a hernia. So I actually made a doctors appointment just to find out that is was much less severe (lymph node inflammation/infection?). But it got me out of work for a day.

Re:So...

[Ironica]

...an educated jury is a havoc-wreaking one?

An educated jury is fine. A jury that is self-educated on matters pertaining directly to the case may be using a different set of facts or law than the other jurors or the judge in reaching their decision. Since the defendant has a right to be present for the case, and to have his counsel represent him for the entire case, a juror who collects information on his own is circumventing that defendant's constitutional right. His attorney has no opportunity to present evidence that may be relevant to your internet searches (but wasn't relevant to the prosecution's case, and so there was no opportunity to introduce it during the trial).

How is this any different than going to a library and looking up info after court?

It's not. They're equally illegal.

Re:So...

[Ironica]

They're also quite skilled at distorting truth and presenting it in a way that manipulates and misleads a jury to get their desired results.

But, since there's TWO sides, and they want directly opposed results... well, then.

Good for them for doing some research

[MikeRT]

The character of the defendant and plaintiff do count. If you've ever been falsely accused of a serious crime out of sheer malice like I have, you become a lot less sympathetic to the victims of crimes until it's proved beyond a reasonable doubt that justice was served.

I applaud jurors who try to figure out what kind of person they're trying. For example, if a juror finds out that a woman claiming she was raped had filed false charges in the past, the juror has a moral duty to vote to nullify the trial on moral character grounds unless this time she has firm evidence like wounds indicative of a violent rape.

Re:Good for them for doing some research

[SaDan]

This is completely the wrong line of thinking. In your example, the woman is on trial for the one instance she claimed she was raped. She is not on trial for the previous claims, and they are irrelevant to the case unless the court thinks otherwise.

Here's an example based on your line of thinking that would not work out for the best: A person is accused of murder. They have previously been accused of murder in the past, but had all cases dropped for some reason or another. The person actually committed a murder this time. Would you rather have the jury decide this person's fate based on the previous cases that had been dropped, or look at the facts presented for the latest case?

Re:Good for them for doing some research

[abigsmurf]

Your argument is perhaps better for suggesting that the burden of evidence to mount a prosecution should be higher for criminal charges.

There are lots of people who cry wolf, but there is also the occasional boy who cries wolf and ends up getting eaten. You could say he deserved to be eaten but that would still leave you with a wolf roaming around that now has a taste for human meat...

Metaphors aside, it's up the lawyers and ultimately the judge on how relevant someone's history is to a trial and if their history would unduly sway the jury. Scumbags are often innocent, habitual liars are occasionally telling the truth. It should be up to the people well versed in the law and trials to weigh up the balance.

Re:Good for them for doing some research

[GeigerBC]

I'm not sure that's the best analogy, although I'm sure mine is not much better. With yours generally somebody ELSE is accusing them of murder. GP's claim is one that is filed by the person, in their example rape. Perhaps a better version is "A person is accused of murder. They have previously been GUILTY of murder in the past, but in this case the person actually did NOT commit a murder this time." Is the jury likely to know this? I'm guessing it gets brought up in court. Just like I think prior accusations of rape should be. Note: I've seen how destructive accusations of rape can be to somebody, even if acquitted in the end. Yes, the accuser had a history of accusations.

Re:Good for them for doing some research

[Attila Dimedici]

Here's an example based on your line of thinking that would not work out for the best: A person is accused of murder. They have previously been accused of murder in the past, but had all cases dropped for some reason or another. The person actually committed a murder this time. Would you rather have the jury decide this person's fate based on the previous cases that had been dropped, or look at the facts presented for the latest case?

More importantly from the way most people think, the person in your example isn't guilty of this murder even though he may have been guilty of previous ones. However, jurors are more likely to convict him if they think that he got off on a technicality in previous cases.

Re:Good for them for doing some research

[Ironica]

I applaud jurors who try to figure out what kind of person they're trying. For example, if a juror finds out that a woman claiming she was raped had filed false charges in the past, the juror has a moral duty to vote to nullify the trial on moral character grounds unless this time she has firm evidence like wounds indicative of a violent rape.

And the defense attorney will often introduce testimony or evidence of the previous false accusations. If the circumstances are so dissimilar as to seem irrelevant, the prosecution will likely challenge such testimony or evidence, and then the judge decides whether it's admissible.

For example... say the woman is 40 and has charged her (soon-to-be-ex-)husband with rape. He threatened to rape his teenage stepdaughter if his wife didn't give it up for him right then, so, no wounds, no violence, but coercion nonetheless.

When she was in high school, over 20 years ago, she was a bit of a slut. Her father found out, and decided to use this against a business rival, by making her go out with his son, and then claiming he raped her. She confided in a friend about it, and the friend testified, so the guy was found not guilty.

If you, as a juror, go digging and find that she had "previously" accused someone of rape, and then it was found to be a false accusation, but don't get the full story, you'd be prejudiced against her testimony... but it would be perfectly reasonable for a judge, having more thoroughly examined the facts of both cases, to find that there was not enough similarity for it to be relevant to the case at hand.

OTOH, if she accused her boss of rape (just after being denied a promotion), and you find out that a year earlier, at a different employer, she accused her boss of rape (just after being denied a promotion), then it's likely you'll hear that evidence, since those are pretty similar circumstances.

In any event, as a juror, you absolutely have a right to decide, *based on what you hear in the courtroom,* whether you believe a particular witness or not. That's actually part of your job. If the defendant gets on the stand, and you just can't believe them, or you just feel compelled to believe them, you absolutely should take that into account when making your decision (unless you were for some reason predisposed to accept or dismiss what they were going to say).

So getting a feel for what kind of person the defendant is absolutely is part of the process. But doing your own background check on them or their accuser (or anyone else involved in the trial) circumvents their right to a fair trial, by introducing evidence that may have been excluded for good reasons.

Allow Juriors to ask questions

[jbolden]

One of the things that was experimented with about a decade ago was allowing jurors to ask questions. This would apply to both witnesses and council. The reason jurors are looking things up is because they have unanswered questions about the case. Get them an official answer.

http://www.sptimes.com/2008/01/04/State/Change_lets_jurors_su.shtml

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[SaDan]

Jurors can ask questions when they are deliberating. The questions are written down, and given to the judge. The judge then gives you an official answer.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[deraj123]

You missed the point. Jurors should have the opportunity to ask questions of witnesses and counsel. The judge is in no position to give you an official answer to a question that you wish to ask of a witness.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[geekoid]

Most likely, they are looking to confirm a personal bias.

Or :
"Maybe this guy did something else he needs to be punished for" type mentality.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[SaDan]

I don't believe allowing the jury to ask questions would make anything easier for either side in a trial.

As a juror, you are supposed to be as unbiased as possible.

It's the duty of the prosecution and defense to provide all the facts and provide all the questions.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[tsstahl]

Judges debate the merit of jury questions, but practicing attorneys rarely support it. The attorneys want the trial to be theater featuring themselves as the actors. Allowing the audience to participate adds a level of unpredictability that their script may not be able to handle.

I am in favor of jury questions.

And the judge from your link who never allows questions is a coward who doubts her own ability in my book (no, I don't know her).

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[jbolden]

True. Jurors want broader background on the defendant. OTOH they may also find broader background on the prosecution:

This cop has been involved in lots of questionable cases. This DA has had many complaints about over zealous prosecution. This judge is running for higher office and so doesn't want to let a high profile defendant be found not guilty.

May cut both ways.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[jbolden]

Sure it is their job, they may fail. Something which seems clear to them may not be clear to the jury. Should failures have random effect or be corrected?

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[SaDan]

You can always appeal if you feel you were on the wrong end of a decision.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[Ironica]

Sure it is their job, they may fail. Something which seems clear to them may not be clear to the jury. Should failures have random effect or be corrected?

Ideally, they'd be corrected, but...

How much do you know about questioning in criminal trials? About the kinds of questions that can be asked on direct vs. cross-examination? When an attorney can treat a witness as hostile? How to lay a foundation for a question? What constitutes hearsay? When I was doing mock-trial in high school, we had a list of 14 objections we could use during testimony... that was a manageable subset of the HUNDREDS of objections that can be raised. These objections each represent a way in which juries can be prejudiced with regards to the testimony presented.

It's not feasible to train all jurors on how to ask questions in a manner that doesn't prejudice the trial. So, they'd have to write down their questions and signal the judge, who would then have to determine if a question could be asked in a permissible way, and then ask it. There's no good way to just let the jurors directly examine the witnesses.

At the end of the day, each side gets an attorney, and it's that person's job to present their case. If they don't do their job, a defendant may be able to request a new trial based on incompetent representation, or a criminal may go free. If the DA's office lets too many apparent criminals go free, we may need to look at how that office is staffed and funded. But having the jury jump in with questions is no solution for that problem.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[jbolden]

Appeals are very hard with a high burden. Questions are easy. Why replace an easy solution with a complex solution?

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[jbolden]

You can just assume that jurors can't prejudice themselves. If the jurors have prejudices you need to deal with it.

Take an example like "assumes facts not in evidence". This is excellent it allows the attorneys to be aware a juror is assuming a fact not in evidence and address it.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[SaDan]

Maybe allowing the easy questions means more appeals? I honestly don't know. I'm just tossing that one out there.

Re:Allow Juriors to ask questions

[Ironica]

You can just assume that jurors can't prejudice themselves.

They can prejudice each other, though.

If the jurors have prejudices you need to deal with it.

No, you don't; you can actually get a retrial (in the event of a conviction) if you can show that the jury (or some part of it) was prejudiced against you.

Take an example like "assumes facts not in evidence". This is excellent it allows the attorneys to be aware a juror is assuming a fact not in evidence and address it.

Hm. But, what if the juror is assuming a fact not in evidence that would lead the witness to testify in a way that was more damaging to the defendant than normally allowed by rules of evidence and testimony... for example, because the witness is also making the same assumption, even though they don't have any direct knowledge of that information?

And what if the defense attorney *is* incompetent, so they don't catch it and object?

Should another juror be allowed to object on their behalf, maybe?

See, it gets ridiculous. Switch it around and make it the prosecution that's incompetent. Now should the defendant get a better chance at acquittal because the jury gave the witness an opportunity to say something that made them look better, in violation of the rules of testimony?

The rules of evidence and testimony have, for the most part, evolved over a loooong time due to actual real-life experience that showed how things could be prejudiced against or in favor of the defendant, and out of a desire to make it difficult to bring hearsay or circumstantial evidence into the courtroom. They're complicated, but I think it's a leap to say they're *unnecessarily* complicated until you've really delved into them and watched how they work in a lot of real-life situations. Before you can re-make a system, you need to know what it does and how *and why* it does what it does.

IANAL... I've probably studied just barely enough law to know what I don't know about it. It makes me reluctant to decide that we can do away with or circumvent wide swaths of our current system without a whole lot more study of the matter.

I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[mosb1000]

They say it's supposed to be a jury of your peers, but then they say that the Judge should have absolute control over the information the Jury can consider when reaching it's verdict. That kind of defeats the point, right? What makes a judge so smart he can decide to withhold information and outside consultation from Jurors, when we normally would have that available to us when making decisions in real life.

I know that there's a concern an outside party may try to manipulate the outcome of the trial (by threatening jurors or deliberately planting misinformation) but it seems to me that this is how our court system works anyway (with the party best able to game the system and manipulate the jury winning out). And such jury tampering could just as easily be prevented by monitoring communications and arresting people who are trying to manipulate the outcome for personal gain.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[ChromaticDragon]

I imagine one thing that makes the judge qualified to judge what evidence is permissible is a better understanding of the issues (and case law and history) related to things like the 4th amendment.

It may be a "fact" that drugs were found in the defendant's car. This "fact" may be deemed inadmissible if 4th amendment rights were violated. It is possible that despite this the defendant was indeed guilty. But it is also possible corrupt cops planted the "evidence".

I imagine there are a slew of things like this. So although I would chafe under restrictions preventing me from doing basic research to better understand things related to a particular case, there's no need to disrespect a judge's role here.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[DaveV1.0]

They say it's supposed to be a jury of your peers, but then they say that the Judge should have absolute control over the information the Jury can consider when reaching it's verdict. That kind of defeats the point, right?

A jury of your peers is a jury of people like you and not, say, a group appointed by the government, or only rich people, or just the judge.

What makes a judge so smart he can decide to withhold information and outside consultation from Jurors, when we normally would have that available to us when making decisions in real life.

That is part of his job. There are facts that would sway the jury via emotion that should not be considered in the case at hand.

The judge has control over the information available to the jury because the jury is only supposed to consider the information that is relevant to the case. Outside information may prejudice the jury against one party or the other. Consider a case where one party has convictions for a different kind of crime many years ago, say marijuana possession. The person is arrested for petty theft. Should convictions for possession be admissible in the current case? That is what the judge decides.

How about a case where a woman is charged with a crime and in the past lost her children to Child Protective Services. Should the fact that her children are in foster care be considered in her current case?

How about a case against someone many believe killed two people and was acquitted? Should that case be introduced? It could cause members of the jury to vote guilty, not for the allegation in the case, but rather for the case he has already been acquitted of.

And such jury tampering could just as easily be prevented by monitoring communications and arresting people who are trying to manipulate the outcome for personal gain.

Who is going to monitor, for how long, and how? And, what exactly is personal gain? What if someone does it to send the defendant to jail because he does not like the defendant? Or, the defendant's wife? Or, tries to get the defendant off for similar reasons? What if one wants to just tarnish the record of one of the attorneys?

One thing to keep in mind is that most people are terrible at determining what is relevant to making a decision and, as a result, make bad decisions.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[mosb1000]

Do you think it may be possible to attempt to explain such issues to a jury? Also, I think that it may be better to presint all the facts to the jury. Seems like anything else is just asking for corruption.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[mosb1000]

"There are facts that would sway the jury via emotion that should not be considered in the case at hand."

Doesn't that mean that the judge is manipulating the jury's emotions (after all, avoiding them is manipulating them too). That is dishonest.

"The judge has control over the information available to the jury because the jury is only supposed to consider the information that is relevant to the case."

I think the question of relevance is best answered by the jurors, given that the resolution of the case is supposed to reflect their views and opinions. I think my married friend explained this problem the best:

When he got married they decided that he would make all the major decisions, and she would make all the minor ones. However, it turns out that the deciding between what constitutes a major and a what constitutes a minor decision is I minor decision, and in the ten years he's been married, they've never come across a major decision.

"How about a case where a woman is charged with a crime and in the past lost her children to Child Protective Services. Should the fact that her children are in foster care be considered in her current case?"

Does the jury think it's relevant?

"It could cause members of the jury to vote guilty, not for the allegation in the case, but rather for the case he has already been acquitted of."

Like OJ Simpson? I'm going to be honest, I don't really have a problem with that.

"Who is going to monitor, for how long, and how?"

The legal teams involved in the case, or the court. They already try to do this sometimes, when appealing decisions.

"One thing to keep in mind is that most people are terrible at determining what is relevant to making a decision and, as a result, make bad decisions."

And your solution to this is giving jurors even less information to make their decision?! I don't know about you, but I always do better with more information.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[Rutulian]

Doesn't that mean that the judge is manipulating the jury's emotions (after all, avoiding them is manipulating them too). That is dishonest.

Perhaps. But the premise behind the justice system providing a fair trial is that the all of the participants, judge/jury/lawyers, are completely impartial and perfectly rational. Of course, this is not the case in reality, so the court system is designed to promote rational consideration of the case at hand as best as possible. If the jury starts making decisions based on their emotional biases instead of on presented evidence, the system breaks down. Some bias always remains, but that is why you get 12 jurors.

I think the question of relevance is best answered by the jurors, given that the resolution of the case is supposed to reflect their views and opinions.

Not really. Hundreds of years of case precedence determines relevance. Initially, relevance should be constrained to the current case, excluding such things as other ongoing prosecutions and racial prejudice. If there are other factors to consider (past criminal record of the defendant, psychological state of the witness, etc), the judge is in a better position to decide because he/she has the benefit of knowledge of past cases to help inform their decision, rationally. A jury member who serves the court for a few days maybe once every several years is not in that position.

"How about a case where a woman is charged with a crime and in the past lost her children to Child Protective Services. Should the fact that her children are in foster care be considered in her current case?"

Does the jury think it's relevant?

It doesn't matter what the jury thinks is relevant. If the prosecution wants to presents the case based on a motive involving Child Protective Services, and the judge allows it, then the jury gets to decide whether the motive was really there. The defense, of course, gets to make a counter-argument so the jury gets the benefit of two interpretations of a given testimony while they make their decision.

"It could cause members of the jury to vote guilty, not for the allegation in the case, but rather for the case he has already been acquitted of."

Like OJ Simpson? I'm going to be honest, I don't really have a problem with that.

You should. Another premise of our justice system is that a person declared innocent isn't haunted for the rest of his life by past allegations. Cases like OJ Simpson's happen, but they are rare.

There are weaknesses in the system for sure, but they are minimized by having multiple unrelated participants with strictly defined roles. If the jury starts assuming the duties of the judge, you undermine the ability of the court to provide a fair trial.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[DaveV1.0]

Evidently, you don't do better with more information because you seem to think it is OK to punish a man for a crime he didn't commit because he was found innocent of a different crime that many believe he committed. It seems you would substitute your judgment for that of the jury that heard the original case and found him innocent.

Your little "married friend story" is an old joke, by an even older comedian. You shouldn't lie in your posts, it lets everyone know you are an idiot.

The jury is not the one to decide if it is relevant. That is the job of the judge. Just like it is the job of the judge to decide other points of law and conduct in the court.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[mosb1000]

The only reasonable standard for what information is admissible in court is that all information should be. Anything else is really just an arbitrary standard which has to be drawn by someone, and we know that people should not make such decisions because no one is beyond bias.

All of our rational judgments are based on our emotional response to external stimuli. Claiming "detached rationalism" is unrealistic, and is a contradiction in itself. People only care about something if they are emotionally involved in it, and they only give attention to things they care about.

"Another premise of our justice system is that a person declared innocent isn't haunted for the rest of his life by past allegations."

But the reality is that they are. There is no point trying to turn a fantasy into reality by pretending, and it makes no sense to try to do that in a court of law, where peoples lives are on the line.

"If the jury starts assuming the duties of the judge, you undermine the ability of the court to provide a fair trial."

The opposite is also true. The jury can not be reasonably said to make its own decisions if relevant information is deliberately and systematically withheld from them. Any information a jury member seeks out could be relevant, so deliberately concealing information from them disrupts the process.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[mosb1000]

"It seems you would substitute your judgment for that of the jury that heard the original case and found him innocent."

OJ has practically come out and said that he did it. If the jury heard him say that, they would convict him too.

"The jury is not the one to decide if it is relevant."

If you don't have open access to information, you can't make a decision the way you normally would, because selecting information is an important part of how we make decisions. It is not reasonable to say that these decisions constitute the judgment of the jury, if they would have made a different decision were they in full possession of the facts.

Why do you assume that just because I was wrong it means I was lying. It is what my friend told me, I knew it was a joke, but I didn't know where it came from.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[Rutulian]

The only reasonable standard for what information is admissible in court is that all information should be.

Nonsense. Unless, of course, you are advocating mob justice. At a minimum, admissible evidence needs to be screened for verifiability and proper procedure. Did the tech do the fingerprint test right? Did he do it multiple times and document it properly? Were proper search warrants obtained? Juries need to receive evidence from proper sources. The newspaper or Wikipedia is not a reliable source.

Anything else is really just an arbitrary standard which has to be drawn by someone, and we know that people should not make such decisions because no one is beyond bias.

It's not all that arbitrary. The standard of admissible evidence is quite clear and agreed upon. It is based on documented court cases and legal experience. The problem of bias is solved by the appeal system.

All of our rational judgments are based on our emotional response to external stimuli.

Not true at all. If you are sitting at an intersection observing the movement of cars, you can logically deduce whether the traffic light is red or green. Naturally, this is dependent on a premise: cars move when the light is green and stop when the light is red, which may or may not be true. But, regardless, the decision is based on reason and is not an emotional response.

It is true that people are not completely rational. One big problem with matters of justice is that people can think they are being rational when they aren't. So the court rules have been determined and refined through experience to try to eliminate distractions that can lead to irrational decision-making. It's not perfect by any means, but it works fairly well.

People only care about something if they are emotionally involved in it, and they only give attention to things they care about.

You can care about being a good juror without being emotionally involved in the outcome.

But the reality is that they are. There is no point trying to turn a fantasy into reality by pretending, and it makes no sense to try to do that in a court of law, where peoples lives are on the line.

Hmmm, ok. So if you are falsely accused of rape and a court acquits you, it's perfectly fine for people to think you still committed rape and discriminate against you appropriately? Sounds like some great justice you have created there. It's true that people think the way they think and you can't control it much, but you can control how a court operates. A court should not use hearsay as evidence.

The jury can not be reasonably said to make its own decisions if relevant information is deliberately and systematically withheld from them.

If a person commits a crime, you should be able to make a rational determination based on evidence at the crime scene and maybe elsewhere. It should be safe to assume that the prosecution will put together a compelling case based on whatever they can find. The defense should do everything they can to question and bring doubt to the prosecutor's evidence, and the result should be a fairly balanced and unbiased presentation. It is not likely a jury member could do better in a few hours of surfing on the Internet. So that is all the information a jury needs to render a determination of fact.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[mosb1000]

"At a minimum, admissible evidence needs to be screened for verifiability and proper procedure."

Or you could just tell people about the source, and let them decide whether or not to trust it.

"The standard of admissible evidence is quite clear and agreed upon. It is based on documented court cases and legal experience."

Just because people agree on a standard doesn't mean its not arbitrary. It's based on decisions which have been made in the past, by people, and by the judge's personal judgment about the applicability of such prior rulings. The theory is that as long as our court system is consistent, that makes it fair. I say that's a bunch of nonsense. In any case, new precedents are still being made arbitrarily judges today.

"If you are sitting at an intersection observing the movement of cars, you can logically deduce whether the traffic light is red or green."

But that only has any meaning in the context of your emotions. Why do you wish to cross the street? Why do you wish not to be hit by a car while doing so? The core of every decision and judgment is an emotional response.

"You can care about being a good juror without being emotionally involved in the outcome."

I good juror is, in my opinion, someone who cares about the outcome. People who only care about upholding an ideal (I just want to be the best juror I can be) are generally self-centered sociopaths. And they are in total denial about the emotions that are driving them to want to be a "good juror". Rationality without emotion serves no purpose and can drive no action. People who claim to be driven by a rational process are lying.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[Rutulian]

Or you could just tell people about the source, and let them decide whether or not to trust it.

They already do to some extent. It is your job as a juror, for example, to determine whether a witness is recounting events truthfully or accurately. But it's not reasonable or necessary for a juror to understand and take into account all of the minutia of evidence gathering. If you don't have any science training, how are you supposed to know about the likelihood of false positives or the likelihood of mishandling the equipment? In the case of proper legal procedure, it isn't a juror's option to disregard evidence not obtained with a search warrant. It is an obligation. Not presenting the evidence is the best way to keep it from being considered.

It's based on decisions which have been made in the past, by people, and by the judge's personal judgment about the applicability of such prior rulings. The theory is that as long as our court system is consistent, that makes it fair.

Yes and no. Decisions on admissible evidence are usually based on multiple rulings, so the whims of a single judge don't control the whole system. Decisions can also be reversed by other cases or higher courts. The system adapts as the needs present. It's arbitrary, but it's controlled, consistent, and supported by experience.

But that only has any meaning in the context of your emotions. Why do you wish to cross the street? Why do you wish not to be hit by a car while doing so? The core of every decision and judgment is an emotional response.

I never said I was trying to cross the street. I was just observing the cars. Yes it is possible to just observe with no other motive. I'm not saying there isn't emotion somewhere, it just isn't part of the decision-making process.

I good juror is, in my opinion, someone who cares about the outcome.

Well, that's scary. A juror who has made up their mind based on how they feel and not on the facts presented isn't likely to be swayed by rational arguments. If you don't have an open and unbiased mind, how can you make a rational decision? If decisions aren't made rationally, they are made impulsively, and that, history tells, is likely to result in more injustice than what occurs in the present system.

People who claim to be driven by a rational process are lying.

People are not completely rational, yes. I've said that before. People can, however, discipline their minds to think rationally, some better than others. There is nothing wrong with emotions, but a decision is more justifiable and, in the case of someone's life, more conscionable if you can support it with rational arguments. That's not easy in some cases, but it can be done. You don't deny your emotions. You have to recognize and acknowledge them if you want to successfully work toward eliminating your biases.

Re:I didn't get how that was supposed to work

[DaveV1.0]

You are not supposed to make decisions the way you normally would because most people can't tell what the proper information to select from is. You, yourself, just admitted you would break the law in your decision.

Indescriminate open access to information, you think it is a wholely good thing? If you say yes, you would be wrong. Look at what indescriminate open access to information has wrought for vaccines. Creationists want indescriminate access to information in science classes so they can preach their religion. The judge acts as a descriminator or filter so that bad, incorrect, or misleading information does not cloud the thinking of the jury.

Apparently, you do not understand the definition of the word lie.

I've done jury duty.

[L4t3r4lu5]

I carried my mobile phone all the time, and used it in the common area to talk to my girlfriend, check my email etc.

I had access to the internet through a wireless hotspot, and I read /. and The Register, NotAlwaysRight.com and other chod websites, and chatted with some other jurours.

I was told that the case had to be decided upon by the edivence heard in court, and that I wasn't to discuss the case outside of the court room or deliberation room. So I didn't. It was that simple.

It's not a question of the rules needing to be changed, it's the need for people to follow them. If they don't, they tarnish the legal process and the people will lose faith. Trial by Jury will become Trial by Media, and we all know that they are TOTALLY unbias.

As usual, this is an education problem, not a rule problem. As IT folk, you should know that the answer is almsot always "educate the user" not "restrict the user".

Re:I've done jury duty.

[Aladrin]

Unfortunately, most people are more easily swayed by emotion than you are.

I agree, I followed the instructions given in the trial. When evidence was mentioned, then withdrawn because it wasn't relevant, the jury as a whole ignored it. At least, they appeared to... I know I did what we were told. (In this case, the 'evidence' would have leaned towards a guilty verdict, and we came up with a unanimous not-guilty right off.)

But not everyone is able to use logic rather than emotion. Some people feel a need to convict someone for a crime without ever dealing with the fact that it might not be -that- person who did it... You can't even get it through their skulls that the guilty person would still be out there!

So they try to limit the information and give those people a chance of actually thinking logically, instead of emotionally.

I agree that it would be much better if things could just be done right... But we're dealing with humans here.

Re:I've done jury duty.

[Anonymous Coward]

chod websites

Really? Chod?

Re:I've done jury duty.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd say the tards that don't follow the rules of the jury be punished. (ie fined)

Its ridiculous the shear numbers of people who try to get out jury duty. There are whole sites, books, etc on how to get out of duty. I was actually glad to get it several times in a couple of short years, however both times the trials were postponed.

Re:I've done jury duty.

[L4t3r4lu5]

Unfortunately, you have to prove that they based their verdict on anything other than logical thought and the evidence put forward in court. I don't know about you, but I'd rather be tasked wityh defending that Fritzel guy at this moment.

Double-Edged Sword

[bratwiz]

This can cut both ways. Yes a juror can look up stuff on the Internet and find out things that the judge has not ruled admissible. But on the other hands, judges aren't infallible even if they're honest, sometimes they make mistakes, don't understand things well enough themselves to make a truly informed assessment of potential facts, or in the worst scenarios are lazy, biased or even crooked. So being able to look something up on the Internet could as potentially reveal exculpatory information. Supposedly the legal system is there to "find the truth" but that's really not the case. Its there to find the most probable truth, or in some cases the most convenient truth. And often times nobody really cares what actually happened or who's going to jail. Look at how many cases have been overturned due to DNA evidence. How many innocent people have sat in jail for years and years because the judge or jury or "legal system" in general has refused to review all the evidence, or when new evidence comes to light, review a past conviction. Its darned inconvenient when guilty people turn out later to not be guilty and some prosecutor or judge has to account for the situation. Easier to just stonewall and let the innocent rot.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[Em Emalb]

It may be a double-edge sword, but said sword is in desperate need of sharpening.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[Maxo-Texas]

It's tough for me.

On the one hand, judges are known to be bored, angry, irritated, sleepy and lawyers are known liars, manipulators, and weasels.

Both the prosecution AND the defense has been caught lying so many times (and the prosecution suppressing evidence that proves innocence).

On the other hand, people can be *real* idiots, make snap decisions on bad information very early in the trial and not get the entire concept.

My one jury trial had one of the jurors arguing for about 20 minutes that "they didn't PROVE he was innocent!" Fortunately the other 11 of us were so obviously astonished at her stupidity that she shut up.

After the trial, the defense attorney told us that everyone knew the guy was innocent, including the prosecutor who bailed and handed it to a junior prosecutor. The only witness was a convicted felon who had a grudge and admitted on the witness stand to carrying a gun (illegal). The poor guy couldn't even make bail and had spent almost a year in jail waiting for his trial to come up.

---

I believe in jury nullification and I also believe if someone gets a fact that results in a correct verdict then I support it.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[tsstahl]

MOD PARENT UP.

As a juror it is your duty to give the defendant the benefit of the doubt.

I would not challenge a judge on a question of law. However, in a technical area where I have expertise, I will defer to myself over what is filtered through an officer of the court any day of the week.

Things are a bit different in a civil trial. Nobody is going to jail and it is usually pretty easy to figure out which side is the moral jerk trying to screw the other side over.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[DragonWriter]

But on the other hands, judges aren't infallible even if they're honest, sometimes they make mistakes, don't understand things well enough themselves to make a truly informed assessment of potential facts, or in the worst scenarios are lazy, biased or even crooked.

Which is why we have an appellate system to deal with errors of law by judges, but which at the same time gives great deference to the jury's findings because they have a very narrow role which is limited to answering very questions of fact based on the evidence provided at trial. Whether that evidence was the correct evidence, whether the questions of fact posed to the jury are correct, etc., are all questions of law.

If you expand the jury's role, you invalidate much of the premise for the deference given to the jury's findings within that role.

Supposedly the legal system is there to "find the truth"

No, its not. Its to serve the law (hence the "legal" in "legal system"), which often doesn't put "finding the truth" ahead of protecting the rights of the parties.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[bratwiz]

Yes, but look at the examples where potentially exonerating evidence comes to light after the fact (after the conviction) but the courts refuse or fail to act due to some technicality or other. There was a guy put to death here not too long ago that was convicted on the basis of seven "witnesses" who all later recanted their testimonies and said they had been coerced by the police or told they would stand trial if they didn't "finger somebody".

Admittedly this is straying away from the original topic of jurors utilizing the Internet, but I think its in the right vein since when it comes down to it, there's somebody's life or freedom on the line-- in a criminal proceeding of course, else its just their money, which in some ways could be just as bad.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[bratwiz]

>> The poor guy couldn't even make bail and had spent almost a year in jail waiting for his trial to come up.

Too bad he didn't swindle people out of billions of dollars. Then he would have been able to spend that year in a luxury penthouse with an ankle bracelet.

American justice, the best money can buy.

Re:Double-Edged Sword

[DragonWriter]

Yes, but look at the examples where potentially exonerating evidence comes to light after the fact (after the conviction) but the courts refuse or fail to act due to some technicality or other.

It seems to me that reveals a real, but completely unrelated, problem with the system that needs fixed.

So.. you're telling me that by reading /.

[DirtyUncleRon69]

I can get out of jury duty?

Re:So.. you're telling me that by reading /.

[Shakrai]

Only if you were sitting on a jury judging a RIAA trial or Hans Reiser ;)

Re:So.. you're telling me that by reading /.

[Anonymous Coward]

So.. you're telling me that by reading /., I can get out of jury duty?

Yes, and as a bonus, you also get out of sex duty, along with several other social distractions.

Re:So.. you're telling me that by reading /.

[Anonymous Coward]

I can get out of jury duty?

Yes. All you need to do is ask one question when you are being questioned for a jury:

"Is Jury Nullification still valid?"

-- stj

Re:GOOD, the system is wrong anyway!

[BitZtream]

I think you need to re-read the parts of the constitution you are refering to, preferanbly without the anti-judge prejudice you so clearly have. Did a judge rape you or something?

Can you blame them?

[Quiet_Desperation]

I know at this point we're all supposed to get in our high horses and preach about civil duty, but I think too many people have seen too many trials where what happens in the courtroom is just flat out broken. In the face of lawyers playing their highly honed bullshit games, and an army of "experts" who can be paid to say anything, and the befuddled contradictions of witnesses of a dubious nature, the urge to seek out more information must arise quite readily.

But, no, we'll just thump our bibles and pretend the system isn't completely hosed.

Re:Can you blame them?

[Anonymous Coward]

But, no, we'll just thump our bibles and pretend the system isn't completely hosed.

But you're better than that. You're going to thump a technical manual, so that's why you know law better than all those gosh-darn backwards bible-thumpers!

Meanwhile, the moderates who don't want the world to degrade into bipolar chaos want to get a word in edgewise, but keep getting shot down by zealots who want action NOW and action that agrees with THEM. Stupid moderates. What did civility ever do for anyone?

Re:Can you blame them?

[geekoid]

Most trials are perfectly fine. Yes sometimes it gets it wrong, and yes improvement is always nice.

This reminded me t post something I've been thinking about since the end of the O.J. trial:
http://harns.blogspot.com/2009/03/criminal-trial-experiments.html

Re:Can you blame them?

[Quiet_Desperation]

Another dumbass completely misunderstands a post. It's almost like they dimly realize their brains are completely within catastrophic error mode, and that's what they post AC.

Challenging authority

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe what needs to be looked at is the practice of withholding evidence from the jury that is to decide a case. As we become a more information based society the legal system can't expect to be the sole arbiter of information coming to a juror.

Twelve Angry Men

[Edward Nardella]

And the entire internet!

Re:Twelve Angry Men

[Arslan ibn Da'ud]

Mr. Keene said jurors might think they were helping, not hurting, by digging deeper. âoeThere are people who feel they canâ(TM)t serve justice if they donâ(TM)t find the answers to certain questions,â he said.

I was just about to bring this up. The whole point of 12 Angry Men was a jury that did their own research (all alone in the deliberation room) and came up with the 'right' verdict. Which they would never have done based only on the 'evidence' presented at the trial. I'd sure like to see how that story would turn out if the jury had had internet access.

So there may be centuries of precedent preventing jurors from conducting their own research, but 12 Angry Men is 'precedent' for the contrary strategy.

Contempt

[Gothmolly]

Liberal application of 30 or 90 day contempt charges would fix this pretty quickly.

Re:Contempt

[russotto]

Liberal application of 30 or 90 day contempt charges would fix this pretty quickly.

You can do that to witnesses and lawyers. But the US system has a long history of not punishing jurors for anything short of out-and-out corruption, possibly because of the experience of William Penn (who was acquitted despite pressure on the jurors). Anyway, if you think it's hard getting people to show up for jury duty now, imagine what it would be like if they knew they could face contempt charges at the judge's whim?

Re:Contempt

[Cajun Hell]

Hey cool. Once we get people used to the idea that jurors can be held in contempt, then we can starting holding them in contempt whenever they don't vote the "right" way.

"Juror, I told you that you have to find the defendant guilty! 30 days!"

Re:Contempt

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh $deity, yes, what we need is juries hostile to the system from the outset having been threatened. That'll improve things no end.

common knowledge

[RichMan]

Common knowledge has always been allowed and accepted as background. The law just has to catch up to the fact that the contents of the internet, right or wrong, form the background of common knowledge.

Also note that before the internet common knowledge was probably just as likely to be right or wrong.

- does a witch float?

The Internet will save our judicial system.

[spinninggears]

Having served on several juries, a number of misconceptions need to be cleared up: You can ask questions. The judge may not like it, but if you submit it properly, do not discuss it with fellow jurors, it might be allowed. The right question can completely screw things up for the prosecution or defense, so you will not be thanked. Juries violate all sorts of instructions all the time, and outside info is part of the game. Getting outside information puts pressure on the legal system to do things right, and they don't like that. I do not recommend causing a mistrial, but at the same time, a juror cannot be expected to remove their brain will serving. During one trial that I was a juror for, the prosecution put on a police officer who stated something that was patently not true. The freeware public defender did not challenge it. I was faced with a dilemma -- quickly verify my correct knowledge (just in case I remembered wrong) or go with the police testimony, and convict an innocent man.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[geekoid]

"legal system to do things right, a..."

Bull.

outside information can prejudice a juror. The role of juror is to come to a conclusion based on the allowed 'facts' in that court room.

If the internet was an unimpeachable source, then we could have a nice discussion about looking into it and it's impact on the criminal system. Since it is not, then you have jurors as likely as not getting bad information.

If it isn't challenged, then it is true for that court room.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[KHUH Tin Omen]

During one trial that I was a juror for, the prosecution put on a police officer who stated something that was patently not true. The freeware public defender did not challenge it. I was faced with a dilemma -- quickly verify my correct knowledge (just in case I remembered wrong) or go with the police testimony, and convict an innocent man.

You are on that Jury, as a "peer", to bring your life experiences and common sense to bear on the testimony and evidence presented. No need to verify your current understanding. You are the Juror, YOU decide what is fact in the case. The Officer presented testimony, you have personal experience that casts doubts on it. In this case, you are really presented with the following options:

Go with your current understanding of this knowledge and determine the officers testimony is not fact, thereby potentially setting a guilty person free.

OR

Discount your current understanding and accept the officers testimony as fact, thereby potentially convicting an innocent man.

In every case I have sat on it was made quite clear: If I was presented with a dilemma like this I was to side with the presumption of innocence.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[squizzar]

There are no restrictions on you contacting him after the trial is finished right? Couldn't you send him a letter and tell him to appeal.

I think that the jury should be allowed to ask questions, so long as they are legitimate (same rules as for questions the prosecution/defence lawyer could ask).

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[D Ninja]

During one trial that I was a juror for, the prosecution put on a police officer who stated something that was patently not true. The freeware public defender did not challenge it. I was faced with a dilemma -- quickly verify my correct knowledge (just in case I remembered wrong) or go with the police testimony, and convict an innocent man.

Can you expand on this? I'm curious what was said that was false that would have caused a man to be guilty and that you corrected.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[RyoShin]

Or, because you're asking the internet of all things, you get back horribly wrong data which is bolstered by misled/malicious other users and you take as correct, which fucks up the whole case.

I'm not terribly familiar with the jury system, but I do think that jurors should be able to ask questions of witnesses/lawyers/the judge if there is uncertainty on something. However, going to the internet is not a good replacement, unless the case is about porn.

I can't wait to hear about an innocent man convicted/guilty man freed because the case rested on the rate of population change by elephants and you went to Wikipedia for that answer.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Can you expand on this? I'm curious what was said that was false that would have caused a man to be guilty and that you corrected.

Dunno about the OP, but I had a friend get a speeding ticket thrown out because he was able to prove that the cop's claims on the stand violated some basic rules of physics (essentially the cop claimed to be able to see around corners).

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[spinninggears]

The defendant claimed he had knowledge of some of the facts of the case because he had seen it on television. The prosecution, through a police officers testimony, claimed that the specific information could not have been in the television report, because TV crews were "kept back". I, however had seen the same report as the defendant, and had the same memory of the evidence as the defendant. The public defender was out of investigative money (in my county they are give a flat amount, if they exhaust it, too bad). I did not violate the judges instructions to not use outside info by retrieving the video on-line, instead I asked a question in writing, that woke up the public defender, who did it instead. At this point, the floodgates were opened, the police began having to retract most of their testimony (which was fabricated). A couple of months later, a judged kicked 2 yrs worth of convictions on a number of people arrested in the same "gang crackdown", citing police misconduct.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[spinninggears]

The "bull" is your assumptions on how juries actually work, regardless on the judges instructions. Jurors often make up their minds before the trial, paying no attention to evidence. Jurors talk about the case with their friends, and hide relevant facts from the judge. Once you are sent to deliberate, you find an enormous amount of "outside information" is being used. The Internet allows for quick correction of bogus information, and gives perspective to the manipulated truth presented by the legal process.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[spinninggears]

"There are no restrictions on you contacting him after the trial is finished right? Couldn't you send him a letter and tell him to appeal." Using the money he saved by having an public defender the first time, and the rent and health insurance saved by being in state prison, I suppose. You can only appeal an error in the trial. You cannot appeal because you did not or could not put on an adequate defense.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[khallow]

I agree with geekoid. Outside gathering of information is wrong and a bad idea. Sure the internet could correct bogus information, but it can also correct correct information. Stating that jurors often do wrong things (like make up their minds prior to trial) doesn't make sense as a defense of this activity.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[Just Some Guy]

outside information can prejudice a juror. The role of juror is to come to a conclusion based on the allowed 'facts' in that court room. If the internet was an unimpeachable source [...]

While I agree with you regarding the Internet, I disagree about bringing in outside knowledge. The summary mentions a juror who might "examine an intersection using Google Maps". While that would clearly be inappropriate, if I happen to have grown up near an intersection and seen two car wrecks a month there for my entire life because it was poorly designed, that's going to weight in my decision whether or not the lawyers bring it up.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think corrupt cops should have their heads publicly split open with an axe. Corrupt politicians too.

Granted, the bar to prove actual corruption, as opposed to honest error, should be high. But, it strikes me as the highest crime is undermining the criminal justice system from within, and the punishment for doing so needs to be severe to act as a sufficient deterrent. Not just death, but public, painful death.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[jordandeamattson]

Actually, you position here does not reflect the history of juries under the Common Law System or in American History.

The current system of 12 people who are spoon fed everything is a relatively recent innovation (i.e. within the 2nd half of the last century).

Previously, juries were active participants, not dumb bunnies sitting on a bench. They asked questions. They engaged in debate. It was quite different. And I would argue better.

Oh, and that great bug-a-boo of the modern age, Jury Nullification? Well, that was an expected part of the package.

Juries made findings of not just fact, but of law. They decided if a law was constitutional or not.

But, the Legal Professionals don't like that and have over time used what were clear problems - juries convicting on prejudice - to emasculate the jury system in this country.

It really is interesting to me to see folks here on /. defending a system that has as its foundation the assumption that people need to be protected from information, which might inflame their passions, so we, the people who know better, will control what they can see and here.

If you have set in on a trial before, you will have clearly seen that the information that gets included and excluded is quite often not due to its inflammatory or prejudicial nature, but rather just because how the judge felt that day.

If you want more background on how the jury system has been perverted in this country, read Akhil Reed Amar's America's Constitution: A Biography http://www.amazon.com/Americas-Constitution-Akhil-Reed-Amar/dp/1400062624 or The Bill of Rights http://www.amazon.com/Bill-Rights-Creation-Reconstruction/dp/0300082770/ref=pd_sim_b_1.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[jordandeamattson]

Unfortunately, this misunderstands the purpose of an appeal.

An appeal is about matters of law and its application. A question for an appeal was appropriate representation.

An appeal is not about matters of fact. The assumption of a higher court is that the lower court got the facts right.

If a fact doesn't get on the record at the initial trial, it cannot be considered without significant work on appeal.

This is why it has been fairly hard to get people freed who DNA evidence clearly exonerate, and why it has often fallen to pardons or clemency actions to free them.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is why it has been fairly hard to get people freed who DNA evidence clearly exonerate, and why it has often fallen to pardons or clemency actions to free them.

Most places these days have laws providing a specific path out for people cleared by DNA. The difficulty isn't in the courtroom, the difficulty is in the district attorneys and such who are put up as roadblocks by the laws, and who faced with their own errors immediately come to the conclusion that DNA tests are bullshit, even as they tout their effectiveness in the cases they prosecute.

Re:The Internet will save our judicial system.

[alexo]

I think corrupt cops should have their heads publicly split open with an axe. Corrupt politicians too.

Granted, the bar to prove actual corruption, as opposed to honest error, should be high. But, it strikes me as the highest crime is undermining the criminal justice system from within, and the punishment for doing so needs to be severe to act as a sufficient deterrent. Not just death, but public, painful death.

Mod points! Mod points! My kingdom for mod points!

Don't forget to include some judges in this

[MillenneumMan]

The overwhelming majority of judges, like the majority of jurors, are savvy enough to understand and deal properly with the ramifications of the information age and how it can impact legal proceedings. But, like some jurors, there are some judges who have not adapted to the information age and fail to control the juries or the attorneys in the cases they hear. Judge Ito was completely ill-equipped to handle the television and celebrity angle of the O.J. criminal trial, so it is no surprise that some judges today are struggling to comprehend and deal with Twitter, Facebook, Google, iPhones, Blackberries, and so forth.

I am not so sure that all of this is a bad thing. I now perceive, for good or for bad, that criminal defense lawyers often have no trouble crossing the line from "guarantee this defendant a fair trial" to "set this defendant free no matter the cost". Yes, I want an aggressive lawyer defending me if I go to trial, but I also want ethical lawyers debating the case before an ethical and informed judge. And if those parties can't be ethical, then I surely hope the jury is smart enough to see the truth and decide accordingly.

A moralilty lesson for the 21st century legislator

[zappepcs]

If making information freely available or if freely available information fucks up your plan, messes with your rules, or somehow breaks your process, then your plan/rules/process was fucked to begin with. Shit or get off the pot, but quit bitching about it. Welcome to the 21st century. The rest of us have been here for nine years or more. Glad you finally made it.

Check brain at the door?

[dazedNconfuzed]

Nothing outside the courtroom should influence your decision in court.

Except that I come into the courtroom with 41 years of real-world experience & education which may or may not be approved by the judge, which may include direct knowledge of relevant laws, and which does include the knowledge that some judges will stifle relevant facts which may throw the case. As a juror, I am not merely a pawn in the game, I am (and intend to remain as relevant) an informed intelligent citizen who holds a 1/12th stake in soveriegnty over the case at hand. Not only are the facts presented up for evaluation by the jury, but the law itself and even the judge are subject to the jury (save only for plainly egregious verdicts). The defendant's freedom, and perhaps life, is at stake - as juror, I owe him more than meek submittal to a judge's biased orders and lawyer's incompetence or ulterior motives. To the officers of the court (attorneys included), the defendant is expendible; the jury should not concur.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[SaDan]

You should run for judge if you truly feel that way. It's not your decision as a juror to decide what laws apply to the case, or what evidence should be presented. You take what you are given, and make a decision.

The prosecution and defense are the ones who need to present the facts and make the arguments. The prosecution needs to make clear the charges, and the judge decides what law applies. That's how it works, and your personal belief of how it should work is irrelevent.

If you want to change the system, be my guest. Do it through the proper channels (get elected and change the law). Just don't try to subvert things in the deliberation room, and hang a decent jury.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Red Flayer]

Except that I come into the courtroom with 41 years of real-world experience & education which may or may not be approved by the judge, which may include direct knowledge of relevant laws, and which does include the knowledge that some judges will stifle relevant facts which may throw the case

I can smell the hubris from my office.

What about things you "know" that are incorrect? Maybe you read something that was incorrect, and now you believe a falsehood to be true?

You, like many slashdotters (at times myself included), need to check your ego at the door.

Your attitude presents a danger to the fairness of the justice system, since as a juror, you would opt to supercede your personal opinion over the laws of the state and the legal administration of those laws in the courtroom. Please make sure you make your viewpoints known during jury selection so that counsel can (rightly) remove you from the jury pool for your refusal to comply with the legal system.

It's pretty common for geeks to think they know better than everyone else, and sometimes this may even e true... I just think when you're dealing with something as important as someone else's life/freedom, it's time to get off your high horse and play the role the justice system is designed to have you play.

If you think a judge is throwing a trial, then I'm sure the defense counsel/prosecutorial counsel feel the same way, and we have system DESIGNED to deal with this (appeals process). It is not your right, or your role, as a juror to decide to disrupt a legal proceeding by playing by your own rules.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Anonymous Coward]

Quite correct. If you are supposed to be a mindless robot only processing what you are told, you might as well replace jurors with computer programs. It is proper and correct to bring your life experiences with you.

But, here's the kicker. Most people displaying a bit of experience and smarts are kicked off the jury. It seems none of the officers of the court want anyone with brains weighing facts vs. experience. They want dunderheads they can fool into voting their way.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Tynam]

The prosecution needs to make clear the charges, and the judge decides what law applies. That's how it works, and your personal belief of how it should work is irrelevent.

On the contrary - the greatest argument for the jury system is that it places a limit on the judge's ability to decide what law applies; thus placing a limit on what the legislature (and judiciary) can get away with. Sometimes the law is stupid or unjust. Sometimes the law is good, but the judge is stupid or unjust. On these occasions it is the duty of the jury to tell the court to get stuffed.

I don't know the US well enough to come up with an example, so I'll use an obvious UK example - the Clive Ponting case.

Fortunately in those cases there's no need to 'change the system through the proper channels' instead. The proper channel has been built into the system; it is called the jury.

(It doesn't always work well, but that's a different discussion.)

Re:Check brain at the door?

[raddan]

It's not your decision as a juror to decide what laws apply to the case, or what evidence should be presented.

Actually, it is. Jury nullification is a widely-recognized right whereby a jury can disregard not only instructions from the judge, but can also disregard the pertinent statute. This is, in fact, the entire point of the jury trial: not just that you may be judged by your peers, but that the law itself is judged by your peers. This is how the jury trial is a defense against tyranny.

The right of jury nullification has not been confirmed by the US Supreme Court, but it has been confirmed by many appellate courts. On the other hand, most courts have concluded that the defense can be prohibited (and penalized) from instructing a jury about their right to nullification.

Anyhow, point being, juries are quite powerful. They are, in fact, the ones making the decisions in a court of law, even if they are ignorant of this fact.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[ctromley]

Jurors need to act responsibly, no question. Twittering on a case in process is irresponsible. As expressed above though, responsibility should also extend to standing up against stupid rules. Example (sorry, can't cite a source): There was a murder case where the victim was stabbed to death and the defendant was found in posession of a bloody shirt with several cuts in it. The defense attorney convincingly demonstrates that the cuts don't match the stab wounds. A juror poses a question. This is obviously very unconventional - but even more unusual, the judge allows it. The juror asks if the cuts match when the victim is curled up in a defensive position. They do. The defendant is convicted. ONLY because a juror spoke up. Another example is video tape of expert testimony that has obviously been edited due to objections by counsel, and then presented without the approval of the expert witness regarding its accuracy as edited. Which of course renders it useless as expert testimony, but it's admitted anyway. Damn the rules. Jurors, and all those involved for that matter, need to do the right thing. Maybe causing a mistrial is the most responsible thing you can do.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[OFnow]

dazedNconfused is simply using common sense.

For information on why this is sensible find out what the Fully Informed Jury Association (FIJA) has to say.

Another source would be a book on "Jury Nullification" (horrible term) so one could get the historical perspective that in fact the notion that juries could be limited is recent (in some sense).

The jury process has many built-in tensions, but we all know that if we don't bring our real-world experience and education to the trial we cannot even understand the testimony...

Re:Check brain at the door?

[TheSkyIsPurple]

> You, like many slashdotters (at times myself included), need to check your ego at the door

But that's part of the system. If someone makes an statement that conflicts with what you know... you take that into account. That's part of why there are 12 of you.

From an example given by a judge to us when I was in Jury duty: "If pencil is on a desk, a person's arm is next to it and nobody else is in the room... you look away look back and the pencil is now on the floor, it's reasonable to assume they caused the pencil to end up on the floor." (or something like that). You don't need truth in a formal logical sense... it's about practicality, and you experience factors into that. Maybe you notice the pencil is round and the table is tilted, so you see a flaw in the presented argument... that observation is not off limits.

>it's time to get off your high horse and play the role the justice system is designed to have you play.

And that is your role. The attorney's will decide during selection whether they think you're experience is too relevant to let you judge properly, etc. That's part of the system.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Red Flayer]

Parent to my post specifically mentioned evidence disallowed by a judge. No juror should factor in that evidence, period -- even if they 100% believe the evidence to be true.

Specifically, though, we were talking about specific knowledge of the law, which is where the hubris is such a huge problem... parent to my post does not factor in that he might be incorrect or incomplete in his knowledge, yet still claims that his specific law knowledge should factor into his decision-making as a juror. This is not acceptable to me.

And that is your role. The attorney's will decide during selection whether they think you're experience is too relevant to let you judge properly, etc. That's part of the system.

Which is exactly what I had stated in my post... parent to my post should make sure to make his stance clear during jury selection. It's one thing for a juror to factor in their personal experience & knowledge; it's another thing for them to willfully dismiss court procedure and law, which is what the poster had suggested he would do.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Parent to my post specifically mentioned evidence disallowed by a judge. No juror should factor in that evidence, period -- even if they 100% believe the evidence to be true."

That's up the jury. If that wasn't the case, you wouldn't need the jury at all.

Maybe the jury are often a bunch of idiots, but it comes with the "jury of our peers" territory.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone's already said this, but I think it could bear repeating.

Regardless of how much you think you know about the law, that is not your place. If the defendant is wrongfully convicted due to wrongful application of the law on the judge's part, that can be reviewed and corrected through appeals. A juror is not held to the same standard because a juror is not (or at least shouldn't be) interpreting the law.

You know all those "intelligent design" people who look stupid because they think they can do science if they dress their non-scientific ideas up in fancy words? That's what you look like right now.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Red Flayer]

That's up the jury. If that wasn't the case, you wouldn't need the jury at all.

I don't know why I'm bothering to respond, but that is 100% incorrect. The jury should absolutely not decide what evidence is admissible or not, that is the responsibility of the judge. The jury should be deciding if the evidence admitted is enough to convict beyond a reasonable doubt.

Otherwise, you'd have evidence disallowed for things like illegal search and seizure that the jury would still use to convict (thus trampling the rights of the accused). Or you'd have remarks stricken from the record due to illegality, that jurors would still factor in.

It's one thing for a jurist to think certain evidence does not prove guilt (i.e., a reasonable alternate explanation of events could have resulted in the same evidence -- like the fingerprints on a glass at the crimescene were from a party the night before), and it's quite another thing for a jurist to decide that certain evidence shouldn't count just because that jurist read on a website somewhere that fingerprints are unreliable (even though they are reliable to the degree required for identification).

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Fulcrum of Evil]

Your attitude presents a danger to the fairness of the justice system, since as a juror, you would opt to supercede your personal opinion over the laws of the state and the legal administration of those laws in the courtroom. Please make sure you make your viewpoints known during jury selection so that counsel can (rightly) remove you from the jury pool for your refusal to comply with the legal system.

The jury is a check on the abuses of legislature and the judiciary - it is intended to supercede the laws at times. If it were not so, then what would be the point?

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about things you "know" that are incorrect? Maybe you read something that was incorrect, and now you believe a falsehood to be true?

What about when the judge "knows" something that is incorrect?

I will be cautious in deciding that I know better than the judge on a particular matter - but when I do, I will act in the interests of justice, not of law.

Re:Check brain at the door?

[falconwolf]

The prosecution and defense are the ones who need to present the facts and make the arguments. The prosecution needs to make clear the charges, and the judge decides what law applies. That's how it works, and your personal belief of how it should work is irrelevent.

If you really believe that maybe you should read what the USA's Founding Fathers thought about jury nullification. Many of them thought jurors were the final arbiters of the law, one of the duties is to decide whether a law is constitutional for instance.

Falcon

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Red Flayer]

The jury is a check on the abuses of legislature and the judiciary - it is intended to supercede the laws at times.

[citation needed]

Re:Check brain at the door?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the defendant is wrongfully convicted due to wrongful application of the law on the judge's part, that can be reviewed and corrected through appeals.

Apalling... That sentiment is absolutely appalling. Being executed or jailed for the years an appeal may take is an unjustifiable punishment. If nothing else, it means the "real" criminal is free to attack again.

If a juror feels the prosecution has not proved that the defendant has committed an action against the valid and constitutional interests of the state or the plaintiff, then that juror can and should vote not guilty.

If you want to argue that enables "bigots to let off friends" then it's up to the prosecution to make sure they are not on the jury.

Wreaking havoc?

[geekoid]

Clearly the end of the court system is at hand~

Please, lets not go overboard here. I think taking away their devices ought to do it.

Re:A moralilty lesson for the 21st century legisla

[geekoid]

"..., then your plan/rules/process was fucked to begin with."

No it doesn't. Technology changed, and yes the rules will change, but that does not mean the rules were fucked to begin with.

Re:GOOD, the system is wrong anyway!

[Attila Dimedici]

So you think that its ok when the police ignore the 4th Amendment? Much of the information that is disallowed is information that a court has ruled was obtained in violation of the 4th Amendment.
You also think that people who have repeatedly been accused of crimes should go to jail, since that is another class of information that is often disallowed. Many people have a tendency to believe that if someone has been accused of a crime before, they are probably guilty of it this time.

Finality and Morons

[MarkvW]

This is not about "blaming" the technology. It is about adapting to the technology. In the old days, as one poster notes, a fool juror would retire to the bar and blab about the trial. This kind of blabbing would get the juror removed and might get a mistrial--if there was anybody out there who was motivated enough to report it to the court.

Now, fool jurors can blab about a trial indelibly, and to the whole world. It is very easy for such information to get back to the court.

You have no idea how awful it is for a perfectly good trial to get mistrialed because of a misbehaving juror. Think about rape victims having to testify about their ordeal a second time. Think about crucial murder witnesses who die after the mistrial and before the retrial. Think about thousands and thousands of dollars in preparation--wasted. And a civil "bet the company" trial where a juror leaks inside information . . .

The internet is increasing the frequency of mistrials. How will we respond? Ignore it and put up with the extreme waste? Penalize jurors? Sequestrate jurors? There are not a lot of choices.

I say hammer the juror whose misbehavior requires a mistrial--with very steep civil and criminal penalties.

Re:Finality and Morons

[spinninggears]

"I say hammer the juror whose misbehavior requires a mistrial--with very steep civil and criminal penalties." Ok, this will require a trial. With more jurors. Who will misbehave. Requiring more trials....

Re:Finality and Morons

[cffrost]

I say hammer the juror whose misbehavior requires a mistrial--with very steep civil and criminal penalties.

Creating a risk for people asked to perform jury duty may cause a shortage of eligible jurors responding to jury duty notices, or causing respondents to intentionally disqualify themselves during jury selection. Offsetting this risk with potential reward would compromise impartiality.

"Internet-caused"

[Cajun Hell]

I'm glad we're not holding the jurors responsible. If "The Internet made me do it!" is a good enough excuse for them, then it'll work for me some day.

Choice

[mordejai]

When system and reality collide, which one should we change?

Bullshit

[MikeRT]

Metaphors aside, it's up the lawyers and ultimately the judge on how relevant someone's history is to a trial and if their history would unduly sway the jury. Scumbags are often innocent, habitual liars are occasionally telling the truth. It should be up to the people well versed in the law and trials to weigh up the balance.

If you would believe the word of a habitual liar, then you, sir, are part of the problem with the system. God knows how many innocent people have been sent to prison because people like you have accepted the testimony of jailhouse snitches just because a lawyer or judge gave their testimony the green light.

Re:Bullshit

[Rutulian]

Actually, determining whether a witness or expert testimony is factual is precisely what the jury is supposed to do. If you doubt they are telling the truth, hopefully you have a reason for that (body language, contradictory testimony, etc) which you can use to support that opinion.

The lawyers simply determine who will testify...both lawyers get a chance to see evidence that will be presented ahead of time so they can prepare a counter-argument. The judge determines whether certain types of evidence are admissible.

Wind?

[MadKeithV]

What? Internet-caused mistral? Must be some new manifestation of global warming!
Sorry, I mean "human-exacerbated climate change".

RIAA

[troll8901]

In the face of lawyers playing their highly honed bullshit games, and an army of "experts" who can be paid to say anything ...

Does the RIAA trials fall into this category as well? I've read Slashdot posts but I still don't understand how US litigations work.

No fact checking for you!

[WassabiCracka]

Seperating the issue of blowing off your civict duty from fact checking, I remain curious about fact checking. I am not a trial lawyer, but I read enough transcripts to know that prosecutors (and of course, defense lawyers) often misunderstand or mischaracterize information, or just plain lie. Either party can raise an objection based on any incorporated presumptions in a statement or question that has not been qualified by the other party, but if it slips past and a juror is disturbed by the misinformation, they cannot simply fact check for themselves, right? Many jurors are more sophisticated than the judge or attorneys in the case on at least one subject matter area. One thing the Intertubes has done is allow people to fact check for themselves and ferret out myths and hoaxes, I would think it would be a tendency of involved jurors to do the same for information presented to them at trial. How many bad decisions could have been averted if jurors had done some fact checking and then presented findings to judge during deliberations? Further disclaimer: big differences in civil and criminal trials, but basic notion of fact checking remains the same.

Re:No fact checking for you!

[cdrguru]

There are problems with jurors doing their own collecting of evidence, which is what you are talking about. You can't limit it to "fact checking" - once you open the door to independent activity materials that may be related are going to be brought to the juror's attention.

So what is wrong with "having all the facts"? Well, the system we have is based on the idea that there are facts that are not relevent but may be distracting. Heck, these facts might be relevent but their distraction far outweighs their value as facts. This starts to get very combative in the legal system. The other problem is nobody is ever going to be able to say conclusively that "all" the facts have been gathered. There is no certanity, just "beyond a reasonable doubt".

There is also the problem of one juror "discovering" something and perhaps not telling all the other jurors. Maybe they just tell a few. What does this do to the idea of a fair trial?

So how to jurors deal with this in a Internet-connected environment? Well, I would think for starters that Internet connected devices need to be confiscated to prevent this sort of thing. Clearly, juror instructions aren't working and you have people that decide they just know better. How do you deal with jurors that decide to do their own investigating at home? Kick them off the jury and hold them in contempt of court. And make sure it is done very, very publicly so everyone in the country knows about it. Do this 10 times and the problem starts to go away.

I think this comes from both a lack of understanding of the legal system and a general contempt for authoritarian institutions. The right way to fix this is probably a lot of education, ethics and as a last resort making an example of people. Unfortunately, we are doing none of the above.

Re:No fact checking for you!

[WassabiCracka]

Well I certainly understand your point. I'm not sure if I managed to communicate mine thoroughly or clearly. I'm not really talking about jurors collecting their own EVIDENCE - which only a party can submit - the article frames it in a fact checking manner by referencing Google Maps, for instance. The "relevance" of facts is for the jury to decide, and for the parties to debate. People are going to have opinions no matter what, even if they can't fact check them on the Internet when they make their decision. Having an opinion based on your own knowledge is not against any law or a basis to strike you during voire dire. In Virginia, for example, lawyers must perform jury duty. Contemplate that for a moment . . . then maybe it's not really an issue of "stupid jurors" thinking they might know better than the parties or the judges. If judges were never wrong their wouldn't be an appeal process. I don't think kicking off involved jurors who do their "own investigating at home" is really in the spirit of the law, making a decision is part of the desired process - this of course does not include disregarding jury instructions on how the law is to be interpreted - but the fact of the matter is the jury is the finder of fact. If you don't believe something, or think one party or other has grossly mischaracterized an underlying premise to present something as "fact" (Al Gore invented the Internet, defendant hates Al Gore, thus defendant attacked the Internet) you're allowed to deliberate your opinion. As a devil's advocate to my own assertions, the Internet is not a source of authority, but it can provide information which does lead to a source of authority (maybe a seminal medical study that the prosecution has twisted, or a case citation that is being misused by the prosecution - who more often than they should actually write the jury instructions). Clearly this will become a deeper issue as time passes. Much like many people forego the sensationalistic sound byte media coverage for the more analytical coverage provided online, defense lawyers, prosecutors and judges may find themselves less knowledgeable than the jurors they are trying to persuade which equals NOT GOOD.

Re:No fact checking for you!

[spinninggears]

"How do you deal with jurors that decide to do their own investigating at home? " The same way you deal with jurors made up their mind before the trial, and refuse to weight the evidence.

Re:No fact checking for you!

[justinlee37]

Here is the big problem -- if a juror does independent research to uncover facts about the case, and uses those facts to come to a decision regarding guilt or innocence, the attorneys for the defense and the prosecution have a right and a duty to hear of those facts and either support or debunk them in the courtroom. Furthermore, some forms of evidence, such as hearsay, are not legally admissible. It is the responsibility of the judge to ensure that hearsay is not admitted into the trial and allowing jurors to do their own research prevents the judge from performing his responsibility and thereby ensuring a fair and legal trial.

Re:No fact checking for you!

[justinlee37]

How do you deal with jurors that decide to do their own investigating at home? Kick them off the jury and hold them in contempt of court. And make sure it is done very, very publicly so everyone in the country knows about it. Do this 10 times and the problem starts to go away.

A better question, then, is "how do you discover jurors that decide to do their own investigating at home?"

If they don't tell anyone they did investigating then there's no way to punish them.

Re:No fact checking for you!

[Registered Coward v2]

One thing the Intertubes has done is allow people to fact check for themselves and ferret out myths and hoaxes, I would think it would be a tendency of involved jurors to do the same for information presented to them at trial.

Yes, the web is such a great collection of verified information and reliable sources that we can all rely on to ensure we are informed

Re:A moralilty lesson for the 21st century legisla

[Anonymous Coward]

it means the rules were based on 'security through obscurity'.

Not really...

[hesaigo999ca]

I think it should still be allowed, as sometimes you need a cross reference that you may know only the name of as a case you want to mention (setting a precedent)...so when you have one attorney making a substantial case, the other is googling non stop for case loads setting precedents to help win the case. There is no way here an advantage or disadvantage as both parties have access to blackberries, not just one side. They both can use it to state a claim.

FIJA

[AK Marc]

The Fully Informed Jury Association are a bunch of nuts, but there are a couple basic things they push for that have been long lost. Jurors should be able to ask questions liberally. If I'm in a jury and don't understand something, I should have it explained right then. Otherwise, I'll probably give it more or less weight that it deserves. I can't decide a case accurately if I don't understand the concepts. Another is that Justice is more important than the court process. The court process is created to find justice, but it needs everyone involved (both lawyers, the judge, and all other court officials) working to find justice for it to work. And the jury is one arm of the court officials, and justice should be more important than proceedure.

Fight the tech WITH the tech.

[Zotdogg]

A couple of techniques come to mind.

Cell Jammers - would probably be difficult to administer though, as the power of the jammer(s) would need to be adjusted to only effect the area inside the courthouse. Kinda like the inverse of a properly constructed wireless network.

Faraday cage - Would require MUCH more work to install but would require significantly less maintenance\administration. Maybe Cell jammers could be used until the building gets a renovation where a Faraday cage could be embedded in the building walls. With the Faraday cage, anyone could bring in any electronic device, they just wouldn't be able to transmit out of the building. Internal building wireless would still be an option if desired but, I think wired would be the best communications solution for the building (and probably required\necessary for emergency concerns).

Re:Fight the tech WITH the tech.

[PPH]

You forgot:

A large bailiff spots you using a cell phone/PDA/whatever in the courtroom and confiscates it.

When I served jury duty, one of the first instructions from the judge was to turn off all such communications devices. I imagine that violating such an instruction could result in more than confiscation. Possibly a few days in the cell next to the defendant you were supposed to be trying.

Very few people are so important that they society can't function without their continual input to Twitter. OTOH, if you can convince the judge you are one of those, you can be excused from serving.

Nothing is controlled

[Kludge]

should be explained to them, that information on the internet is not completely reliable (sometimes it is completely unreliable), that 'facts' on the internet are just words/pictures/sounds/videos of something that could have been changed by chance or doctored on purpose.

Yeah, whereas information presented in court is always true and reliable.

Crap. Now you made me make a mess laughing at my own joke.

Re:Always on

[kayditty]

DONT.

You might be found innocent, too.

[SrWebDeveloper]

Of course there is a likelihood of mistrial if the jurors are on their PDA's browsing the web to research their trial. But on the other hand, if you were a defendant and such research revealed you were innocent - I'd take the mistrial, wouldn't you? This goes both ways, is my point.

Re:A moralilty lesson for the 21st century legisla

[spinninggears]

Tell that to every innocent person released from death row after 10 or 15 years.

Re:Not all data is online

[Technician]

I was on jury duty a while back and ran into the same problem. How much external reference material is to be disregarded? We had a case where the action was at 2 AM. It was very dark. I geocache. I used a GPS to check the sunrise and sunset as well as the moon rise and moon set on the night in question. (a feature of the GPS for sportsmen) Since it was an outside source of information, the state of the moon could not be considered, so I did not share my knowledge after asking if the data was admissible. We tried the case without the information I did not share.

The case is not specified in this post; so for those wondering, there was a full moon that night. I may have been influenced as I knew which party was lying, but I couldn't share my reason for disbelieving one party. We used the other evidence and it was sufficient enough to reach the right conclusion.

I could see a jury avoiding the bias in press and other things that may poorly sway a jury, but unrelated public data? Should that be allowed? Tide tables, weather, and other verifiable conditions not presented at the trial, why shouldn't the jury be able to investigate a little?

We stuck to the rules to prevent a mistrial, but it made the case more difficult to properly decide.

Citizen vs. juror?

[dazedNconfuzed]

It's not your decision as a juror to decide what laws apply to the case, or what evidence should be presented.

"Ignorance of the law is no excuse."
"Anything you say [or do] can and will be used against you in a court of law." ...except when on a jury? where suddenly I am to have no access to law or fact save only those hand-picked by those who may have ulterior motives? WTF?

I've studied enough law to know that when someone says "X is illegal", there is usually an unmentioned exception. I also know that the judicial system is designed for "may the best argument win", not determination of legal truth and application of moral consequences. I also know that most people are guilty of something, ensuring that all can be controlled (paging Ayn Rand), and want a jury to have the ability to say "enough - set him free".

The defendant's liberty, and perhaps life, is on the line. That defendant could be you or I - let us hope our juries have the wisdom to discover factual truths and judge the law, rather than merely consent to whatever facilitates the prosecutor's political career or the judge's tee time.

Re:Citizen vs. juror?

[SaDan]

Have you ever been part of a jury in a criminal trial? I'm curious.

Re:Citizen vs. juror?

[Rich0]

I have, and I can confirm two things:

1. The grandparent's position is completely contrary to the instructions of any judge I've served on juries under.

2. That I wouldn't hesitate to do exactly as the grandparent suggests if I felt that justice required me to do so.

I am bound by my conscience before I am bound by any law or instruction of the judge. Apparently the founders of the constitution agreed which is why courts have juries in the first place.

The beauty of nullification is that there is no way to prove that it happened. As long as a juror states that their decision was based on the facts of the case and not the law the courts simply need to accept the decision as-is, or just set aside the jury verdict entirely (which of course is a farce from a constitutional standpoint).

Don't get me wrong - jurors shouldn't be getting into endless debates over fine points of law - that is what the judge is for. I'd go as far as to say that jurors should almost always defer to the judge entirely on the law. However, I would never suggest that a juror ought to violate their conscience and pretend that their decision is just some simple evaluation of facts that clears them of any responsibility for what happens to the defendant next.

Re:Citizen vs. juror?

[Qzukk]

I've been on the jury of one criminal trial, and based on the result, I cannot possibly believe that the founding fathers and/or the current justice system participants actually expect jurors to pretend to be ignorant. I understand that as a jury we're not supposed to fabricate our own evidence or take into account information outside of the scope of the individual crime for which the person is being charged. (For instance, as soon as we got in the jury room one of the jury members who knew the law pointed out that this isn't the first time the guy had been convicted of assault, since the charge was felony assault with a deadly weapon and first non-injury assaults are misdemeanors. We agreed to ignore this, after all, as the stock spam says: "past performance is not indicative of future results".)

But seriously... After several of the jury members checked their brains at the door with their cellphones, our deliberation process ended up headbangingly stupid, with the following list of "reasonable" doubts:

1) Knives aren't deadly weapons (I don't remember the exact legal gibberish now, something about a tool designed to or capable of causing a certain level of injury which actually included stuff like permanent disfigurement in addition to death, but it took almost an hour of arguing before we all settled on agreeing that they were deadly weapons. At one point this included "Maybe the knife is made of rubber?", "Nobody thought that a rubber knife was important enough to mention?", "It isn't the defense's job to prove he was innocent!")

2) The prosecution did not prove that the person was not insane (the "knowingly" that was part of the assault charge definition). "Maybe the CIA had him on mind control drugs?" "Now you're just being an asshole".

and its corollary

3) A man who tells his estranged wife that he's going to kill her could be acting in the "heat of passion" when after making the threat, he goes home, then comes back in the morning with the aforementioned maybe deadly knife and breaks down her door and threatens again to kill her with a (rubber?) knife. (We spent the rest of the day here.)

After we delivered a jury verdict we were supposed to wait for the verdict to be read adn the court process finished up. so that we could be debriefed by the judge. I asked if this was supposed to be "grief counseling" and everyone else (including the judge) thought it was a pretty good joke.

If the legal system wants ignorant people to listen to cases, I suggest they send out their jury duty notices to the local maternity wards, where they can find dozens of completely fresh blank slates if the court is willing to take breaks for naps and diaper changes.

Wong Wrong Wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.fija.org/

manumission

[Anonymous Coward]

It is called manumission (from the old slave days when slaves were freed) and varies state by state by jurisdiction, etc. Convicted felons can regain all or most of their rights, it usually takes a petition and appeal.

Search for Truth?

[Anonymous Coward]

Whatever happened to the search for truth?
Justice and the truth aren't always in agreement.

I have an idea...

[Pyrion]

Why not pay jurors enough to give a damn?

Re:Not all data is online

[Mark J Tilford]

Odd. The usual example for judicial notice involves a defense attorney using a Farmer's Almanac to put the phase of moon into evidence, and discredit a witness.

Wow!

[commodoresloat]

I can get home from that day's proceedings and have Wikipedia summaries of the law, tons of background info on the defendant and plaintiff, and every news article about the case ever printed in about 2.5 minutes using the internet.

That's amazing! What kind of printer are you using?

Re:Not all data is online

[Technician]

Odd. The usual example for judicial notice involves a defense attorney using a Farmer's Almanac to put the phase of moon into evidence, and discredit a witness.

Actually in this case, it was the prosecution attorney who failed. The defendant was guilty. It would have done their case damage if the defense brought that up. It would have discredited the defendant.

The one thing myself and several members of the jury noticed, is the defense attorney. His ears grew red when he really stretched the truth. The jury quickly picked up on this stress indicator as a good lie detector. We didn't let the attorney know about his built in BS stress indicator. ;-)

Jury Nullification....

[stonewolf]

of the whole messed up court system.

At least that is what it sounds like to me. The jurors are acting like free citizens of a free country and trying to find out what really happened and who is really guilty. That is their job. That is what they are sworn to do.

I've been on a jury. The court won't let you take notes. They will not allow you to look at the legal code covering the crime. They won't let you look up the precedents sited. They won't even tell you what "normal" punishments are. After only a few hours of deliberation and after having every request for information and clarification refused, I would have used the Internet to get the information if I could have. The whole court is designed to create an artificial reality, a construct where the jury is kept in the dark about most of what actually happened.

If you want an education on how courts really work, go spend a day sitting in a court as a spectator. See the bull that takes place behind the jury's back. I've done that too. It will make you sick.

I really hope that the wireless, always available, Internet changes the way courts operate. I'm looking forward to the first report of a juror leaving a bug in the court room so he can hear what goes on when the jury is sent out of court.

Stonewolf

Fully Informed Jury Association

[Anonymous Coward]

Send all jurors to http://www.fija.org/ to educate them. That will solve all the problems!

"criminal record"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wrong. A felony conviction removes you from the jury pool (and voting, and firearms ownership). Not simply any "criminal record".

Re:GOOD, the system is wrong anyway!

[Anonymous Coward]

Look honey, another idiot tax protester! I thought they were all extinct!

"Yes, the yellow fringe around the flag means it's a Navy court and I don't have to pay my taxes."

Keep barking on, lunatic.

Jury Nullification

[Modern Primate]

One positive thing that can come from this situation is that jurors can more easily be made aware of Jury Nulificaton

Only sometimes

[Roger W Moore]

You do know they generally have very good reasons why the evidence is not admissible, right?

Only sometimes. For example suppose a policeman searches a car because he thinks he has probable cause to do so and finds a body. If a judge disagrees that he had legal cause to search the car why should the evidence be inadmissible? Discipline the police officer for the illegal search by all means but don't let that stop the evidence that was uncovered from being used.

Re:Only sometimes

[Copid]

The question is, what's the payoff vs the punishment? If the risk is suspension and I'm going to put a murder away, I might do it. If the risk is that the murderer goes free, it does away with the incentive to do it. Instead of increasing the punishment, you simply do away with the reward entirely.

Re:Only sometimes

[Roger W Moore]

If the risk is suspension and I'm going to put a murder away, I might do it....Instead of increasing the punishment, you simply do away with the reward entirely.

Exactly - if the officer is convinced he is going to get a murderer then don't you want him to take that risk? The reward is not just his but all of society's. What it will stop though is police deciding to search your car just because they don't look the look of you. Indeed they are far, far less likely to do this if they risk getting suspended. If they are pretty sure they will find nothing and just want to intimidate you then there is now a penalty of suspension whereas without the threat of suspension the inadmisibility of evidence that they don't expect to find in the first place is hardly a deterrent.

Correct Consequences

[Roger W Moore]

If you make your decision based on knowledge obtained in an illegal search and publicized in the media, when it was clearly illegal and prohibited at trial, you remove one of the constraints preventing us from descending into a police state.

Rubbish. If the evidence is valid and not tainted by the way it was collected then it should be allowed. If the police conduct a clearly illegal search then the correct response is to discipline them (and by clearly illegal I don't one that with full hindsight and a high paid lawyer might possibly be shown to be illegal).

Re:Correct Consequences

[ShadowRangerRIT]

Who disciplines them? Other police? Ever heard of the Blue Wall of Silence? Police rarely police their own except in extreme cases (usually involving corruption, and sometimes not even then). Prosecutors aren't going to discipline them either, and the only recourse a judge has is to disallow evidence. Defense attorneys, TV dramas notwithstanding, do not have the magical ability to have legitimate evidence thrown out. If the cops play by the rules, then there is no problem. Given their greater than usual powers, they need to be subject to greater than usual standards. Which would you rather have, a single drug user let go due to the actions of a single overzealous cop, or a whole department of cops bound by no rules except the ones they make themselves?

Re:Correct Consequences

[Roger W Moore]

Given their greater than usual powers, they need to be subject to greater than usual standards.

Exactly. The way you hold someone to a higher standard is that you discipline them if they fall short. Releasing criminals punishes society and frustrates the police from doing their job. It would be like a teacher being told that because she smacked little Johnny when she should not have the entire class will be made to forget everything they learned from her when of course the correct response is to discipline the teacher for inappropriate behaviour.

Better Solution

[Roger W Moore]

If the rules of court allow it, they get pencil and paper. Otherwise, they sit and listen.

As countless years of educational research has shown: if you want people to pay attention and take information in you need to make things interactive. Instead of having the jury sit there let them ask questions. If they don't understand an argument they can ask for clarification. Of course you'll need the judge to ensure that the questions are fair and relevant but I bet you'd get them paying a lot more attention if they were active participants.

juries need information and an overhaul

[bravo369]

People are used to having information at their fingertips and this is no different. They want ALL the information before they decide to send a guy to jail for 20 years. Facts are facts and let the jury decide what counts and what doesn't. I sat on a jury where a guy was accused of dealing drugs. we sat through 2 days of testimony and witnesses before the 2 sides agreed to a plea deal. it wasn't until AFTER that he told us this defendant was arrested and convited 8 times for the same offense. seriously, how is that not relevent in the case? character counts and like i said, facts are facts and him being arrested 8 times is a FACT i need to make my decision but the court decides to hide. anyway, i'm starting to think the whole jury system needs an overhaul. When i served on the afore mentioned drug case, they dismissed jurors who I thought would make great jurors. people who admitted to using drugs in the past, people who's sons were used drugs, an ex-cop type person (wasn't a cop but worked for the police dept before retiring) who would have been great to have because part of the crossexamination was picking apart the cop's procedure. They also dismissed everyone who claimed financial hardship so all that was left on the jury were people with good jobs, retired or owned their own businesses. Right...like that was a jury of the guy's peers. then speaking of dismissing jurors who actually know stuff, if a case involves a computer crime then what is the point of having someone on the jury who doesn't even know how to turn one on but that's who gets on. They can't see through the BS spewed by BOTH sides. so they fill juries with blind, inept people who can't pick out this from that in the testimony and now courts are complaining that people have the AUDACITY to actually educate themselves in order to make an informed decision. please. time to bring the court system back from the dark ages.

I take it you've never been on a jury.

[falconwolf]

I was on a month long trial last summer

Some people have all the fun. Though I've been called to show up for jury duty twice neither tyme was I even questioned. I'm a firm believer in jury nullification and wanted to serve on the jury for a drug trial to say how bad drug laws are.

Falcon

what's fair?

[falconwolf]

Most trials aren't really about "truth" as much as about being "fair". And what is "fair" is totally stacked against the state, and in favor of the defendant.

How is it fair for someone who may not be able to afford an attorney to fight against a state prosecutor who has the resources of the state behind him?

Falcon

The worst part is,

[falconwolf]

the Jury is supposed to be a passive box that just absorbs whatever information the lawyers wish to provide.

No, the worst part is though jurors are supposed to be the final arbiters of the law juries are often instructed to decide guilt or innocence of the law. An easy way to be dismissed from a jury is to say you believe in jury nullification.

Falcon

You can be interested all you want.

[falconwolf]

But you cannot base your verdict on what you think about case law. All you are allowed to base a verdict on is the information presented in the courtroom.

BS! At least in the USA not only is it the duty of the jury to decide guilt or innocence but it's also the juror's duty to question the law itself. The USA's Founding Fathers thought jury nullification was one of a juror's greatest duties.

Falcon

The jury isn't the trier of law, that's the judge'

[falconwolf]

job

No, the jury is the final arbiter of the law.

Falcon

Jury nullification is a systemic abomination

[falconwolf]

No, jury nullification allows the people to tell politicians what is constitutional and what laws are good. John Jay, the first First Chief Justice wrote: "It is presumed, that juries are the best judges of facts; it is, on the other hand, presumed that courts are the best judges of law. But still both objects are within your power of decision... you [juries] have a right to take it upon yourselves to judge of both, and to determine the law as well as the fact in controversy".

Thomas Jefferson said: "...it is usual for the jurors to decide the fact, and to refer the law arising on it to the decision of the judges. But this division of the subject lies with their discretion only. And if the question relate to any point of public liberty, or if it be one of those in which the judges may be suspected of bias, the jury undertake to decide both law and fact." Writing to Thomas Paine he then went on to say "I consider...[trial by jury] as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution...."

Falcon

Re:Jury nullification is a systemic abomination

[Anonymous Coward]

> No,
Yes.
Jury nullification only exists because the alternative is to impose a test of "validity" upon the jury's verdict.
Juries don't have the *right* to ignore the law; they have the *power* to ignore it.

Trial 2.0?.. Just an old issue...

[mrboyd]

I really can't why this is a new "internet" issue. Judge can confiscate anything they want including cellphone, blackberry, ipod and they can sequestrate the jurors if they think it's necessary.

And before everyone had a browser on his phone jurors could still do some research from home or get some biased information on TV/newspaper/friends/spouse opinion/co-workers...

Just because someone added the words "mobile internet", "google" or "2.0" doesn't make it a new problem. :)