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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."
allow informational sites and searches to be counted as admissable
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.
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.
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.
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.
Remember RFC 873!
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?
[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.
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.
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.)
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.
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.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
"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.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
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.
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.
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.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
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.
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!!
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
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.
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.
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.
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!
Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
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.