[Peace-discuss] Jury Nullification

[John W.]

On Mon, Feb 2, 2009 at 5:13 PM, Ron Szoke <r-szoke at illinois.edu> 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.


And I'm not clear on what you're not clear about.  :-)  But it's probably
difficult to discern.



> 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.


Well, the law has a specific jargon with specific meanings that are not
necessarily the same as common dictionary meanings.

In the famous obscenity case whose name I have now forgotten, it was
articulated that the material in question had to "appeal to the prurient
interest" and "have no socially redeeming value" (I'm slightly paraphrasing)
according to "contemporary community standards".  But that was just that
holding in that type of case.  "Contemporary community standards" wouldn't
apply across the entire spectrum of cases.

But yes, more broadly and generally, the jury of one's peers, as the trier
of fact, does represent in a sense the conscience of the community.
However, they're supposed to apply the law to the facts as the law is
explained to them by the judge.  They don't get to come up with their own
unique interpretation of the law.



> 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.


I'd say that was and still is extremely "politically freighted".  And I'd
say that was an instance of jury nullification.



> 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,


I'd say so.



> & what conclusion do we draw from that?


What do you mean?



> -- Ron
>
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