The American Jury System offers the United States citizens an opportunity to be proven guilty or innocent when a crime has been committed. The twelve person jury system was established in England hundreds of years ago. Originally this system was made up of twelve men and this was huge because they had the power to go against what the judge wanted in court. There are many vital points as to why our American jury system is successful; jury trials by the numbers, ownership by jury members towards the accused, how reliable or unreliable evidence is viewed by jurors, gender balance and the detailed screening process in which jurors are selected. Based on results, less than two percent of civil and criminal cases are heard by jurors. (Doc. A) Our jury system is excelling because these are only serious cases that are being heard by our American Jury System which means we can be very selective in our jury members. In most criminal cases, defendants agree to a guilty plea or a plea bargain. By settling these cases most federal officers are able to gain more information about other pending cases through informates which enables our judicial system to work efficiently. …show more content…
People want criminals off of the street and to serve their rightful punishment which gives the citizens ownership not only in their community but in the judicial system as a whole. The Seventh Amendment gave us as citizens, the right to serve as jurors, just like the constitution gave us the right to vote, have freedom of speech, and bear arms which are all just as important to this great nation. (Doc. C) This is a vital part to this country because of how the people can impact the future and ensure that everyone has consequences for their
Under the Sixth Amendment. The Sixth Amendment guarantees a criminal defendant the right to impartial jury. The jury will consider the evidence against the defendant and decide whether to find him or her guilty of the crime. Twelve jurors must agree in order to find a defendant guilty or not guilty. If the jury fails to reach a unanimous verdict and finds itself at a standstill, the judge may declare a mistrial.
Jurors should not know anything about a specific case and not follow public affairs and read the news (Doc F). When a person is selected to be part of a jury, they have to say an oath stating that they will not use their emotions to determine the verdict of a trial. If a juror is caught using their emotions, they will be fined for a crime called perjury. Since there are twelve people in a jury, there is a variation of opinions when the jury decides a verdict. But, a judge is more professional and knows how to only use the evidence provided and be less biased.
When pilgrims first sailed to the new world they maintained their roots in English common law despite their quest for religious freedom. The Pilgrims established Colonial law three years after their landing on Plymouth where it was ruled: “that all criminal facts, and also matters of trespasse and debts betweene man and man should be tried by the verdict of twelve honest men to be impaneled by the authority in forme of a jury upon their oath.” The first case of a jury trial was in Plymouth, 1630 when John Billington was accused of murdering John Newcomin, a fellow colonist that was aboard the Mayflower. The defendant, John Billington was sentenced to hang after the jury convicted him of “willful murder by plain and notorious evidence.” Around the same time the Pilgrims settled in what would become Boston,
Another reason citizens question juries is that they have bias from personal experience or the media. The defendant and the prosecution criticize the jury system because the actual jurors may not understand the situation from any point of view because they come from different lifestyles (Doc E). The American jury system is not a good idea anymore because juries are not experts in law, they have bias, and are not “a jury of peers”. Because jurors are not experts in law, they are subject to be
As a result, the trial and the jury should be more objective. The jury's verdict on whether the defendant is guilty is essential to the operation of the jury system. Since their decision might have far-reaching effects, they have become an integral element of the trial process (Ruderman, 2020). However, this may also make jurors a troublesome part of the process since they may need to thoroughly examine the material or apply the right roof standards to hand down verdicts. 3 resolve these problems.
The seventh amendment of the Bill of Rights is about how the people have the right to trial by jury for cases that involve money. This means that if someone wanted to sue another person they would have to go to the jury. For example, in a civil case, where there are two parties and one is trying to sue the other for something the other did. My argument for this amendment is that there are a whole jury to decide and not just one person if the person is being sued or not. My argument against this amendment is that it takes a long time to go through a civil case some civil cases went up to 3 years or more.
In the article of Connect US “… prosecutors and defendants to have limited removal power over the formation of the jury so that it can seem fair to both sides in the case. ”(Chief, Editor) This makes it where both parties have some leeway to either stay with the chosen jury or replace someone if they feel that it will be biased for one side. Also having a trial by jury highly eliminates bias because of the twelve people, which makes it harder if a jury to make everyone vote guilty or not guilty. It’s important to know someone’s background and what condition they are in before being given an important task such as jury duty since they are contributing to either putting someone behind the bar or releasing them back to society, in the article Connect US, “…Judges and lawyers have the opportunity to question each one to see if they can be fair and impartial.”
“The boy is five feet eight inches tall. His father was six feet two inches tall. That’s a difference of six inches. It’s a very awkward thing to stab down into the chest of someone who’s half a foot taller than you are. ”-(Juror two, 54)
In the event that you carry out a wrongdoing, you have the privilege to a reasonable trial in which the court chooses whether the administration has the privilege to bolt you up. Be that as it may, on the off chance that you don't perpetrate a wrongdoing, the legislature has the privilege to "bolt" you up (in a jury room) without wanting to and compel you to render a choice in the matter of whether the administration has the privilege to bolt up another person who has carried out a wrongdoing. Is there some kind of problem with this photo? Jury obligation is basically group administration for individuals who haven't carried out a wrongdoing. Around a half million individuals a year in New York State alone are subjected to jury obligation.
“In 2005 the Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that juries heard 4 percent of all alleged criminal offenses brought before federal courts. State courts match this trend” (Dzur, 2013, p. 31). Legal scholars also noted that state courts over the past 30 years have dropped 15 percent when utilizing a jury for a criminal trial, while only a 10 percent drop when a judge decides the case (Dzur, 2013). These statistics are dramatically higher for civil cases (Dzur,
This was determined from way back when America was first being created. Originally the U.S was control by the British but one of the main reasons for our independences from them other than the fact that the U.S. did not like their high taxes but also was because the jurors and their rights. According to the video “Annenberg Classroom: Juries” when a judge did not like the juries verdicts they were fine and threatened to have their nose cut off. American wanted their judicial to be fair and equal for all. However, they are wrong in the fact that all citizens should need to serve on the jury because people will misuse this power and will not truly understand their effect on the case and more importantly the people live on trail.
The utilization of plea bargains complicates the ruling of Gideon v Wainwright because it creates a mechanism which seeks to process defendant, quickly through the system by incentivizing lesser
Twelve Angry Men is in many ways a love letter to the American legal justice system. We find here eleven men, swayed to conclusions by prejudices, past experience, and short-sightedness, challenged by one man who holds himself and his peers to a higher standard of justice, demanding that this marginalized member of society be given his due process. We see the jurors struggle between the two, seemingly conflicting, purposes of a jury, to punish the guilty and to protect the innocent. It proves, however, that the logic of the American trial-by-jury system does work.
They have to decide important matters, verdicts, without giving reasons about their decision (Hostettler, 2004); they can nullify a verdict even if the evidence is overwhelming (Joyce, 2013). Furthermore, juries are too expensive, prolong the length of the trial (Davies, 2015) and the guilty can walk free, while the innocent is convicted (Joyce, 2013). In addition, jurors should be representative of society, but it is not