[Peace-discuss] what about jury nullification?

[Ron Szoke]

This needs some clarification.  Surely a jury cannot "nullify" a law in the sense of 
erasing or obliterating it.  But it can protest the way the law has been applied (or 
misapplied) in a particular case by voting "not guilty" & attempting to persuade 
others in the jury room that this is the appropriate thing to do in the 
circumstances.  This is sometimes the only thing available that may rein in an 
overzealous & out-of-control prosecutor.

Like all other correctives, it is at times subject to abuse, as the cases of all-white 
southern juries or the O.J. Simpson jury show.  They too could claim that they were 
representing "the conscience of the community," or at least an influential segment 
of it.

-- Ron Szoke