There are many criticisms surrounding, the jury system currently in use in our Australian legal system, these criticisms have recently been brought into the light over the past few years with many cases, such as the Casey Anthony case where a mother was acquitted of murdering her daughter as the jury stated, after less than 11 hours of deliberation, ‘there was not enough evidence’ when the forensic evidence was clearly stacked against her. This lack of competence by the jurors is a criticism that Lord Denning argued about in What Next in the Law? (1982) he debates that the selection of jurors is far too wide, resulting in jurors that are not competent to perform their task. Lord Denning suggested that the jury party should be selected in much the same process as magistrates are, with interviews and references required, although this initiative has several obvious problems, a more complicated selection process would be much more time-consuming and costly to the Australian tax payer; finding sufficient people willing to take part would prove incredibly difficult and a jury that is intelligent and educated can still be biased, and may be more likely to be so if drawn from a narrow social group. For a trial by jury case to be effective, no bias should exist in the jurors judgments, the jurors should understand clearly their role and key legal terms, and the jury system should represent the community as a whole and its standards and views whilst upholding the rights of the accused and society and remain cost and time effective.
A grand jury is composed of twelve people, to determine if there is enough evidence to send an accused individual to trial. Although they may not determine if the accused individual is guilty or not, they can issue a formal document saying there is enough evidence for the prosecutor to take the accused to trial also known as an indictment. According to, Texas Politics Today, “a grand jury may return indictments simply because the district attorney asks them to.” Which in the end is not fair, because the jury may believe that there is not enough sufficient evidence, but because they feel pressured they issue an indictment.
1.0 Introduction Section 80 guarantees the right to trial by jury. The Queensland Jury Act 1995 provides the current legislation which decrees that all trials on indictment must be by jury. In the ninety years since this legislation was passed, an increase of trial complexity has occurred, leaving many jurors with the inability to comprehend the information and evidence procured in a trial. This proceeds to make lay juries ineffective and unreliable. To remedy the situation, specialised juries should be introduced to minimize the amount of incorrect verdicts, misunderstandings in court, jury misconduct, and avoidance of jury duty.
Since the jury system has been around since the country claimed its independence, and the population has been growing rapidly since then, it would be assumed that a trial involving citizens would become more commonplace. This is not the case, however, so it can be inferred that citizens dislike jury duty so much that it has failed to gain any traction since its inception. Civic duty is now perceived as civic punishment, and it is safe to assume that it is mostly thanks to jury
This is stated in Document C in the Jury System Mini-Q “Observers of the American jury system have remarked on its ability to elevate ordinary citizens into self-governors…” This is stating that the jury system is let alone remarkable that it is also a way that will increase the motives of people to present them to the government. On the Importance of the Jury System it states that “The Jury service is a duty of citizenship, similar to paying taxes and voting.” This is saying that people view this as an act of duty that just as paying taxes and voting people have to give back to their government and participate in the jury trial. Another quote from The Role of the Public is “Courts have a responsibility to perform at a higher level of respect to citizens serving as jurors and to improve every aspect of their jury systems.”
Our jury system stretches all the way back in England hundreds of years ago. Whenever a crime was committed in a community, a judge and his or her jury would come together to put the accused on trial. The judge served more as the legal expert over the trial. However, the jury was made up of twelve men who lived in the area that the crime was committed. These ordinary citizens were the ones that decided the verdict of the case.
In Twelve Angry Men, Juror 1(Foreman) says, “Anyway this friend of my uncle’s was on a jury once, about ten years ago- a case just like this one..... They let him off. Reasonable doubt. And do y’know, about eight years later they found out that he’d actually done it, anyway.” By allowing different people onto the jury, they have the ability to give assumptions and information about other cases which can sway and harm the verdict.
"Jury System; a system in which the verdict in a legal case is decided by a jury on the basis of evidence submitted to it in court. " Starting at eighteen, you become eligible for jury duty – something many have to do as one of our civic duties, however, it wasn 't always this way. As far as historians know, the jury was established by William the Conqueror who brought it to England from Normandy. However, this system that he brought was nothing more than a system that had witnesses who knew of the matter in question to tell the court what they knew. It 's a known fact that our courts and laws have changed and evolved since when we first created them, otherwise lynching and stoning would still be acceptable punishments for varying crimes.
“Good Morning dear classmates and teacher, I will be delivering a speech explaining why the US Judicial Branch is Good but Far from Perfect…” Thanks to the principle of Separation of Powers, the U.S. government is divided into three branches, each responsible for accomplishing specific tasks. “The judicial branch is in charge of deciding the meaning of laws, how to apply them to real situations, and whether a law breaks the rules of the Constitution or not. It is said that The Constitution of the United States is the highest law of our Nation. The U.S. Supreme Court, the highest court in the United States, is part of the Judicial Branch.
Citizen Required To Serve? Jury a group of citizens sworn to give a verdict in a legal case on the basis of evidence submitted to them in court. Being able to serve on a jury is an absolute privilege to do for some and one thing that makes this country very different and unique from others. Serving on a jury should not be required for citizens. Some people believe serving on a jury should be a requirement for every citizen.
The Permian-Triassic extinction The largest of the Big Five was the end-Permian or Permian-Triassic extinction event roughly 250 million years ago, which eliminated as much as 95 percent of the planet 's species. Before this extinction, marine animals were mostly filter feeders stuck in place on the seafloor, such as crinoids or "sea lilies. " Afterward, the seas became far more complex with mobile creatures such as snails, urchins and crabs.
However, a judge is only one person that majored in criminal cases and crimes. Since judges are not representative of society as a whole, "...the experiences and perspectives of women, minorities and poor and working-class people would be underrepresented in a system in which all cases were decided by judges" (Text 2, Line 34-36). This highlights the importance of the jury system in contrast to a judge for a jury has members who are experienced in society, since they are part of the common people. Also, it clarifies the lower classmen and their experiences, as opposed to a judges upper class experience in society. Moreover, all ideas and views of society are demonstrated in a jury system.
What is the duty of jurors? Jurors fulfil a very important function in the legal system. In a criminal trial, they are charged with the responsibility of deciding whether, on the facts of the case, a person is guilty or not guilty of the offence for which he or she has been charged. However, in the play Twelve Angry Men, Reginald Rose indicates how jurors’ perceptions of the case are changed by their personal prejudices, such as life experience and emotion. When a person is selected to be a juror, he should be confident with the decision that he makes and do not be a follower.
The American Government is made up of three branches: judicial, legislative, and executive. Americans are very fortunate to have a judicial system in the United States, which is based on the idea that everyone is innocent until proven guilty. The same problems still happen today in 2018 that happened in 1957 when the movie Twelve Angry Men by MGM was made. Common reasons jury duty is not popular include taking time off work, not getting the same amount of pay as if one is at work, and simply just not wanting to be there. People will always be biased from their own experiences.
This essay will briefly discuss the role of the jury and how it works, from the principle behind it, to the method with which members are selected, and to the powers available to jurors. Moreover, it will outline advantages and disadvantages of trial by jury, and it will point out a couple of ways which could ameliorate this type of trial. Trial by jury has been a part of the criminal justice system since the 12th century (Davies, 2015), it is considered an ancient right and a symbol of liberty (Hostettler, 2004). It creates no precedent and it can decide challenging cases equitably without making bad law, it also brings members of the public into the administration of justice and into an understanding of legal and human rights (Hostettler,
