[Peace-discuss] Jury Nullification

[LAURIE SOLOMON]

> The local community sets its standards for justice/injustice based upon
its values.

Yes; but within certain parameters, this is true.  It is not always for the
good either.   Nevertheless, it is always problematic to define where the
boundaries of a local community begin and end.  Do we stop at the state? The
county? The municipality? The neighborhood or development within a
municipality? The city block or rural route?  It is also problematic as to
who in the community sets the standards.  Is it a majority, a plurality, or
a minority; is it a majority, plurality, or minority of the registered
voters, of those who actually vote on those standards in a referendum or is
this a virtual or presumed vote on unspecified and unstated standards?

>Jury nullification tends to erode central control of 
>values and permit local interpretations
>of what is a desirable lifestyle.  It favours grassroots governance.

It can also favor or promote vigilantism, mob rule, disregard for minority
opinions and rights, conformity to popular demands and values, succumbing to
peer pressure not to go against the views of one's neighbors even if you
know they are wrong, among others, such as cherry picking of juries and the
manipulation of jury selection.

>There is nothing that says that the 12 people on a jury have to agree on 
>the verdict.

True enough

>They have to agree in order to convict, but they don't have to agree

I understand and agree with the first part; but I do not understand what you
are trying to say in the last part. Are you saying that, while it takes 12
members of the jury to agree to a "guilty" or to a "not guilty" finding for
the decision to be one of those, jury members may not always agree on a
decision which can result in a hung jury.  While this is also true, it means
that one person can hang a jury.  However, while the effect may be the same
as jury nullification, the question is does that comprise jury nullification
or not.   I would contend that attributing the label of jury nullification
to such an instance or to those instance where the jury finds the defendant
guilty or not guilty contrary to the presented evidence and/or the pertinent
law turns on the motivation of the juror or jurors in question for that
trial.


-----Original Message-----
From: peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net
[mailto:peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net] On Behalf Of E. Wayne
Johnson
Sent: Monday, February 02, 2009 6:23 PM
To: Ron Szoke
Cc: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net; C. G. Estabrook
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Jury Nullification

The local community sets its standards for justice/injustice based upon 
its values.
That is actually a pretty good thing.  TV and Mass media has attempted to
standardize culture and values across the country.   I can't imagine how 
that can be good.

Connecticut might with validity forbid activities that Kentucky with 
equal validity allows.  Saline county and Lake county, both
in Illinois are populated by very different people with different 
lifestyles and goals.  They can decide what is just and unjust in
their locales.  Jury nullification tends to erode central control of 
values and permit local interpretations
of what is a desirable lifestyle.  It favours grassroots governance.

It seems to me that all of the items you list below are instances of 
jury nullification.

There is nothing that says that the 12 people on a jury have to agree on 
the verdict.
They have to agree in order to convict, but they don't have to agree.

Ron Szoke wrote:
> I'm still not clear how one can draw the distinction between a
misapplication of 
> the law and a direct appeal to the jury's intuitions about injustice.  
>
> The classic formulation is that a jury of peers represents "the conscience
of the 
> community," I believe, which is how some obscenity prosecutions by
politically 
> ambitious prosecutors are derailed.  
>
> Less politically freighted are some euthanasia cases, as in a few early
cases 
> involving Dr. Kervokian, it seems, where there was a murder charge, but
the 
> jury decides that it was a mercy to end the pain & suffering in certain
terminal 
> & hopeless cases, & so acquits.  
>
> Also in point are some putative murder cases I've heard about in which a 
> horribly deformed baby is born & is immediately killed by a parent,
apparently 
> in the belief that the newborn will soon die anyway, & could never
possibly  
> have anything approaching a normal human life even if it did survive.   
> Reportedly, in some such cases the jury has refused to convict, tho there
is no 
> doubt  that the defendant actually did what he is charged with doing.  
>
> Are these cases of jury nullification, & what conclusion do we draw from
that?
>
> -- Ron
>
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>   
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