I have never done this and would be interested to hear of other people's experiences. Not to discuss the cases (are you allowed to?) but prompted by the Archers special trial (I am not a follower but the wife is so I hear it passively), more about the dynamic between the jurors. I thought the Archers thing was clever in having a diverse group of people who brought their personal experiences and prejudices into the decision making. I can now imagine getting myself kicked out when confronted by a couple of idiot jurors who just don't get it.
Here in Oz, if your being sized up by the legal people to be a juror, if you here for example, it will be a six week trial and you want to get out of it, you say you are 'you have a holiday booked' or ' that you may be prejudice to a race or gender' and you normally get off. If you say you have to go to work, the judge will say, 'bad luck'. I was called ( you can only be called 3 times in your life ) ........ 3 times with 3 years, in my early twenties. When one person said, 'they were booked to go overseas' .................. everybody started saying the same thing! We must have had a whole cruise ship load of jurors in the court house! I, for whatever reason, wasn't picked, thank God.
I had an absolute ball doing mine for two weeks at St. Albans. Was recently out of a long term relationship so spent most of it trying to crack on with birds. I don't think under-30s should be allowed on juries. Nowhere near enough of us took it seriously and in one case we found an obviously guilty man not guilty (not a violent crime) because the policeman for the prosecution was such a knob.
I've been called up three times, Stan, but the last two times got out of it. The first stint, about twenty-odd years ago, got me three cases: one involving an accusation of arson and the other two concerning possession with intent to supply narcotics. On the arson case the accused was a disgruntled, lowly male employee of a company who it was alleged started a fire on work premises whilst doing a night shift. We the jury thought that he probably did it, but there was insufficient evidence to convict. The accused in one of the possession trials changed his plea halfway through, so we were dismissed, but the other concerned a traveller whose camp was raided and he was found with a sizeable quantity of magic mushrooms which the prosecution alleged was too vast to be holding purely for personal use. Again, no evidence that he was supplying - although he probably was - so we couldn't convict. He had already pleaded guilty to possession. Embarrassingly, as I was outside the court waiting to cross the road to go home, the accused had been picked up in a car by a mate and, as they passed by, recognised me as a juror that had just acquitted him. The car slowed down, he hung out of the window, and in full view of others bystanders, some of whom may well have been court officials, gave me the thumbs up and shouted "cheers mate!" What struck me about my fellow jurors was that the younger members just wanted to have a laugh. The magic mushrooms were left with us as Exhibit A and they were messing about trying to open the bag and eat some, bringing about a sharp rebuke from the foreman and me. Meanwhile, some of the older members wanted to convict the traveller simply because of their prejudices towards travellers. One even went on a rant about not wanting his sort outside the school gates peddling that filth. Others had to press the point that you could only convict on evidence and not on personal prejudices or supposition. To the extent that my experience is representative - which it probably isn't - I took away two thoughts: (1) that many cases are brought before the court without a sufficient case to answer, certainly insufficient evidence and poorly prosecuted, and (2) that many of the younger jurors are ill-equipped to take their duty seriously and are more likely to acquit, whilst the older generation are possibly more likely to convict on the basis of their own prejudice rather than fact. A pretty sorry state of affairs.
Called up twice at borough court but got out of it once, lot of wasted time & hanging about, money they pay is ****e unless it's a long case & then goes up quite a bit, my case was a stabbing alledged, can't remember all of it but to cut a long story short the bloke got away with it, not enough evidence & he thanked the jury for making him not guilty outside, think the woman was a bit of drama queen claiming this
Have been called three times and went to the courthouse twice. We have a call-in system with juror numbers in the part of New York where I live. The first time I was dismissed because I knew one of the lawyers and because of my area of law practice. My experience this year was much different. I was in the jury pool selecting for a murder trial that was going to last six weeks. There were about a hundred prospective jurors in the courtroom. Only twelve were in the jury box at a time to answer the lawyer's questions about their bias, etc. On Day 1 I informed the Judge that a six week period away from the office would destroy my law practice. He told me that was not a good enough reason. I had to wait two more days until the Prosecution and Defense attorneys had their time to question me personally. By then I was committed to absolutely blowing up the respective positions to get out of there. Mission accomplished. I was dismissed at the close of Day 3 by agreement of the People and the defense counsel, neither one of them wanted to ever see me again. I followed the trial in the local newspaper. The defendant was convicted very quickly, although he seemed like such a "nice young man" when sitting there in court.
I've been called twice Stan. The second time I was excused as I has just started as a sole trader. The first time I only had to serve on one case in my two weeek stint. I think all of us jurors (this is only by memory as it was 40 years ago!) thought it absurd that the case was heard at Crown Court with a jury. A case of affray. I can't remember any interaction betweeen us apart from the verdict deliberations & I was the only one to go to the pub at lunchtime! Well, I did use their car park with the managers permission! In those deliberations it became clear that most of us had reached a decision at the very start (based on how the defenders looked) & that the barristers would have to work to change our minds. In the end, the one defendant (three defenders in total) that I had decided was definitely guilty was the only one that we acquited! My abiding memory is how the defence barrister was the best witness for the prosecution & that the judge was hopelessly out of touch with my generation. In general, I would agree with Watford(?) that some under 30's may lack in life experience to carry out their duties properly, but this was a case that badly needed imput from us of that age range. All in all though, I was certainly thankful that it wasn't a taxing case & that I didn't think my judgement would have any real impact on society or the defendants.
Reading this I'm wondering if many of you are in favour of trial by judge or judges alone instead of the tried (see what I did there?) and tested jury system?
I did mine in St.Albans too mate, I was only early 20's, not been called up again since. Fortunately for me they pick more than enough for each case, I wasn't one of the 11 names picked at random from our group so had 2 weeks paid leave from work as I had to be within 20 minutes of court as a reserve.
I was called up many years ago for a case at Elephant & Castle. However, cycling home from work one evening about a week before I was due in court I was involved in a road accident when a car turned right across my path and I went through the windscreen from the outside in. Although I was not badly injured I couldn't bend my left leg, I had a hell of a battle to be excused.
Trial by a judge, but only if it's Dredd, Col. On a serious note, I remain in favour of twelve good men and true, but believe there should be some sort of test to determine whether one is fit to be a juror or not. No idea what it should be, mind, but I understand that once upon a time one had to be a home owner, which is not what I'm advocating a return to, but at least it sought to apply some sort of qualification to what is a hugely important role to perform.
Too many trials and not enough Home Owners these days. Here in The US you have to be almost dead to get out of jury duty now, and seeing some of the verdicts, I think some are,
I have been called twice but got out of the 2nd as it was only 10 months after the 1st.we were on a drugs trial, 3 black accused with an all white jury spent 8 days listening to evidence 2 days deliberating and a women said "it not up to us to find them guilty that's the judge's job" some people shouldn't sit as they don't have a clue, needless to say they were found not guilty
Be a citizen and do your duty. We take our rights for granted and one of them is to be tried by a jury of our peers so you can feel proud that you are part of the legal system which is the envy of the rest of the world.
I'm getting that impression too, it's either something to be avoided or not treated seriously if you are 'young'. I am oddly disappointed never to have been called, I think it's a part of being a citizen. But if some jurors are filled with resentment with being there or just want to have a 'laugh' I think I'd prefer to take my chances with a judge/judges if I am ever in the dock.
I was called about 12yrs ago and had a bodily harm case- basically a brother and sister had gone round someones house dragged him out and beaten him with baseball bats then stabbed him for nicking some bike or something. Turns out to be wrong house and guy didn't have a clue what going on until first hit with bat! Did it Aylesbury but the people involved were local to MK and drank in same pubs! Evidence was a bit sketchy as to how they had got caught but seemed that someone had sobbed them in. Anyway we gave guilty verdict at which point the gallery went mental shouting at us all saying we know your faces and where you live, even tried to get into the court to attack us. We had police escorts to cars to go home!! There should be more segregation as up to verdict all in same entrances and exits. Hope I never have to do again.
