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The county courts

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the magistrates' courts

 

 

Text 2: The Jury

1_______________

England places unusually heavy reliance on its lay judges - magistrates. Another important

amateur with judicial functions is the jury, a body of twelve ordinary citizens called for the trial of a particular case. Throughout its history, the jury has attracted both the highest praise and severe criticism. The debate has largely centred on three areas. First, there is the issue of the jury's competence. Opponents argue that the judge, by reason of his training, experience and intelligence', is better equipped to understand law and facts and pass a fair judgment than lay persons without legal training and experience. They refer to the practice of those continental countries that do without juries. Supporters, in contrast, maintain that the jury as a group has wisdom and life experience beyond that of its individual members; that its inexperience in legal matters in fact secures a fresh perception of each case, avoiding judicial stereotypes.

Second, there is the debate about the jury's interpretation of the law. Critics complain that juries often refuse to follow the law, either because they do not understand it or because they do not like it. However, some studies have shown that judges would have reached the same decision without a jury in four-fifths of all verdicts. And where juries deviate from the judge, this is due to their own subtle, and not always conscious, sense of justice, because they rely on the spirit, rather than the letter, of the law.

And finally, defenders of the jury system believe that the jury provides an important civic experience encouraging people 'to give to the community'. They also believe that the jury guarantees the integrity of the whole system of justice since twelve people are more difficult to bribe than one. However, this is countered by the arguments that jury duty imposes an unfair burden on the citizen, that the jury is expensive and contributes to delays that plague civil litigation.

 

2__________________

Normally juries consist of twelve members (eight in the county court). They are selected at

random from electoral rolls to achieve a fair cross section of the community. Jurors must be between the ages of 18 and 70, ordinarily resident in the UK for five years since the age of 13. They are not paid but given expenses while they are on jury service, which is usually for about two weeks but may last much longer, especially in civil trials. In cases involving national security and in terrorist cases, checks are made on prospective jurors on police and Special Branch records (this is called jury vetting). These powers, however, are not fixed in a statute or precedent but are governed by the Attorney-General's guidelines.

Some groups of people are ineligible for jury service, such as mentally ill persons; and some are disqualified, such as persons who have been imprisoned for more than three months within the preceding ten years. A sentence of five years' imprisonment or more disqualifies a person for life. For the rest of society jury service is compulsory. Until 2003 there were numerous exemptions and automatic rights of excusals for many categories of people, such as MPs and members of the House of Lords, members of the medical profession and armed forces and so on but they have all been swept away. The reason for keeping lawyers, policemen and the like off juries was the fear that they might unduly influence their fellow jurors but today people no longer defer to professionals or those in positions of authority the way they once did.

At the inception of a trial the law permits trial counsel to challenge prospective jurors for cause (excuse from service by giving reasons). Unlike the prosecution, which has unlimited rights of challenge, the defence's right is limited to two challenges. Both counsel ask candidates questions like 'Have you read or heard anything about the case in the media?' - to exclude any undue prejudice. If any bias surfaces as a result of questioning, the person is excused from the panel. If a juror happens to know the defendant or a witness, this too may be a cause for excusa/. In a US court the lawyers are allowed to question potential jurors about their beliefs but in Britain this is not permitted. Therefore, unlike in the USA, where the lawyers' examination may extend for several weeks and several hundred people may be questioned to select 12 men and women and a few reserves, in England a jury is 'usually 'sworn in' in a few minutes.

 

3________________

Originally, the jurors were local witnesses and they passed judgment on the basis of what they

themselves knew. Now they determine the facts of the case entirely on the basis of the evidence presented in court. The job of the jury is to decide questions of fact (to 'find the facts'), and it is the judge's responsibility to guide them on questions of law. This distinction between fact and law is very important. In a murder trial, for example, questions of law would be: just what the crime of murder means in English law, what evidence is admissible under the rules of evidence, what precisely the prosecution has to prove, what law should be applied in' reaching the verdict. All this will be explained to the jury by the judge. And questions of fact would be: whether the defendant did indeed commit murder, whether the witnesses are telling the truth, whether the alleged events actually took place, etc. - these questions are decided by the jurors themselves.

 

4_________________

Trial by jury is conducted under the supervision of a judge. He decides what the jury mayor may

not hear under the rules of evidence. Since factual matters are to be decided by a body of laypersons, it is important that they should not be misled by evidence that is plausible on the surface but may be misleading. When instructing the jury at the end of the trial, the judge will summarise the evidence and discuss its weight, as well as explain what law they should apply in reaching the verdict. When the evidence presented is unsatisfactory, the judge may withdraw the issue from the jury and direct the jury to acquit a defendant (in a criminal trial) or find for either claimant or defendant (in a civil trial). However, he cannot direct a guilty verdict in a criminal trial. Finally, if the jury's verdict is manifestly against the weight of the evidence, it may be set aside and a new trial ordered but this is an exceedingly rare occurrence. In 2001 the Court of Appeal set aside the jury verdict for the first time in 100 years (Grobbelaar v News Group Newspaper LTD & ANR).

 

5__________________

In criminal cases the jury is restricted to deciding issues of guilt, while punishment is generally left to the judge. In civil cases the jury decides both issues of liability and the amount of damages. Traditionally, the jury was required to reach its decision with unanimity but since 1967 majority verdicts have been allowed. The jury must strive for unanimity for at least two hours; if unanimity is not possible, the judge may accept the following majorities: 11 -1, 10 - 2, 10 - 1,9 - 1. When the required number of jurors cannot agree on a verdict, the judge declares a mistrial, which means that the case, unless it is withdrawn, must be tried anew. Once juries have been sent out to consider their verdicts, they no longer have to stay late at court until they have finished or be taken to hotels. The judge may now permit them to separate - go home and come back to court to carryon their work the next day.

 

6__________________

In English law, investigation is not permitted into the deliberations of a jury. Jurors deliberate in secrecy, reach a decision by a vote and present their verdict without giving reasons. Not only are jurors forbidden to discuss the case with outsiders during the trial, they are not allowed to comment on the case or their deliberations after the trial. If they do, they will be facing a prison sentence for contempt of court. By contrast, in the United States a juror stepping out of a courtroom at the end of a trial is free to comment on the case and the verdict and the deliberations without fearing prosecution.

The Contempt of Court Act 1981 makes it an offence to 'obtain, disclose or solicit any particulars of statements made, opinions expressed, arguments advanced or votes cast by members of a jury in the course of their deliberations in any legal proceedings'. Its main purpose is to prevent jury tampering, or 'jury nobbling', the practice of bribing or threatening jurors in order to secure a particular verdict, but it also, among other things, inhibits jurors from selling their story. From time to time recommendations are made in England to conduct controlled research into jury deliberations, for example, by means of bugging (unobtrusive recording so jurors would not know that they were being recorded). But many lawyers think that research of this kind is a can of worms best kept unopened. They fear that the mere fact of such research might damage public confidence by sowing doubt about the integrity of verdicts; it might also inhibit jurors from expressing their views frankly, out of fear of potential reprisal.

Legitimate research is restricted to general questions in questionnaires or to simulation studies. Questionnaires concentrate on acquittal rates and the levels of perverse verdicts (verdicts given by juries which refused to follow the judge on a point of law). Simulation studies employ focus groups or shadow juries. Twelve people are hired from the community to attend a mock trial session. The lawyers summarise their arguments, examine or cross-examine 'witnesses' (who are often actors), then watch the shadow jury deliberate through a two-way mirror. From this exercise, important information may be developed as to what life experiences make a favourable juror, what arguments are doomed to failure and what statements are likely to carry the day.

 

7 ________________

Despite all the controversy surrounding the jury, in practice its role has been greatly diminished over recent years. If before the Common Law Procedure Act 1854 most civil cases were tried by jury, by the beginning of the 1990s jury trial occurred in considerably less than 1 per cent of all civil cases. A surprisingly small proportion of criminal cases go for jury trial. The majority are tried in the magistrates' court, and only 3 per cent go to the Crown Court. Taking into account that more than 60 per cent of the accused plead guilty when the case reaches the Crown Court (thus eliminating the need for the jury), as well as cases where the judge directs an acquittal, less than 1 per cent of all criminal trials result in a iury verdict. At presentl the United States is the home of the jury system for both criminal and civil cases: more than 90 per cent of all jury trials in the world occur in the United States.

From time to time attempts are made by the government to reduce further the right to trial by jury, but they meet with fierce resistance from those who believe that any further shrinking of the right of trial by jury would amount to a serious denial of a basic civil liberty. According to a representative study conducted in 2002, 85 per cent of 900 people questioned trusted a jury to come to the right decision and 82 per cent felt that jury trial was fairer than trial by a judge. Remarkably, 69 per cent against 27 would prefer to retain jury trial rather than cut costs (The Times, February 5, 2002). But despite the high regard the public have for the jury trial, it is hard to deny the fact that in England the system is in decline.

In 1956 Lord Devlin, one of the most distinguished judges of the twentieth century, wrote, 'The first object of any tyrant in Whitehall would be to make Parliament utterly subservient to his will; and the next to overthrow or diminish trial by jury, for no tyrant could afford to leave a subject's freedom in the hands of twelve of his countrymen. So that trial by jury is more than an instrument of justice and more than a wheel of the constitution: it is the lamp that shows that freedom lives.' Jury trial statistics are a sad reflection on these fine words.

 

8________________

Jurors are human, they do not leave their biases and prejudices at the door when they enter the

courtroom. Prosecution and defence, for their part, try to mould and sh~pe juror attitudes. But there is another big-time player not mentioned in law books that may influence considerably the outcome of the case. When a big criminal case happens and hundreds of journalists descend upon a courtroom, one may wonder who the real jury in the case is. Or, as someone has noticed: 'Once the media decides guilt or innocence, it is hard to change that decision.'

 




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г) Побудительные мотивы и формы научного прогресса | Robert Di Silva rose to his feet and began his opening statement. | Abraham Wilson sat there a moment, his face defiant; then he slowly rose to his full height of six feet four inches. | It was too late to repair the damage that had been done. "No cross," the District Attorney said. | Magistrates and Judges | Name the crime 1 |


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