getting way off topic!
Posted by
Jon Elson
on 2000-08-05 22:16:22 UTC
Doug Harrison wrote:
because
my uncle was a lawyer.
Then, jury reform came into law in the state of Missouri, and I
eventually
got called again. It was a wonderful experience. There were 6 men,
6 women, 4 black and 8 white, a pretty good cross section of our
community. The case was an ugly mess, with a black defendant and
a black victim, former boyfriend/girlfriend, the boyfriend broke into
her apartment and raped her one night, then came back the second
night and abducted her because there were family members staying
with her. She was injured during all this.
The first testimony, after some excruciatingly boring police testimony
verifying the chain of evidence custody, was from the victim. The
prosecutor's first question was "where did you meet the defendant?"
The victim replied almost inaudibly "When we was locked up."
I expected a mistrial right there, but no. After a while, they sent us
to
the jury room for a recess, and everybody was a little reluctant to
say anything. Then, one of the black women said "Well, they're
both low life!" (or low class, or something like that) and everybody
got a good laugh. That broke the tension, and we had a very good
time working out what we thought the defendant really did, and why,
and what he was guilty of, and not proven guilty of. We convicted
him on a number of counts, but didn't convict on a couple that
were stretches by the prosecutor. The defendant got 30 years!
(He elected to have bench sentencing - he would probably have gotten
off a lot lighter with us. But then, the judge saw his record, and
although
we were clued in by the victim's testimony that he must have had some
kind of record, we didn't see it because we didn't do the sentencing
part.)
I've heard all sorts of horror stories of juries going wild, people
who just weren't rational, etc. But, my experience was an amazing
and wonderful one. We worked together, carefully examined the
information given to us, and reached a decision.
Jon
> >I was called for jury duty years ago, and was thrown out on my ear
> > I used to try (successfully) to get out of the jury pool, but then I
>
> > realized, I have no right to complain about what juries do, unless
> _I'M_
> > willing to serve. If regular folks aren't willing to serve, what
> the else
> > do you expect from a jury?
because
my uncle was a lawyer.
Then, jury reform came into law in the state of Missouri, and I
eventually
got called again. It was a wonderful experience. There were 6 men,
6 women, 4 black and 8 white, a pretty good cross section of our
community. The case was an ugly mess, with a black defendant and
a black victim, former boyfriend/girlfriend, the boyfriend broke into
her apartment and raped her one night, then came back the second
night and abducted her because there were family members staying
with her. She was injured during all this.
The first testimony, after some excruciatingly boring police testimony
verifying the chain of evidence custody, was from the victim. The
prosecutor's first question was "where did you meet the defendant?"
The victim replied almost inaudibly "When we was locked up."
I expected a mistrial right there, but no. After a while, they sent us
to
the jury room for a recess, and everybody was a little reluctant to
say anything. Then, one of the black women said "Well, they're
both low life!" (or low class, or something like that) and everybody
got a good laugh. That broke the tension, and we had a very good
time working out what we thought the defendant really did, and why,
and what he was guilty of, and not proven guilty of. We convicted
him on a number of counts, but didn't convict on a couple that
were stretches by the prosecutor. The defendant got 30 years!
(He elected to have bench sentencing - he would probably have gotten
off a lot lighter with us. But then, the judge saw his record, and
although
we were clued in by the victim's testimony that he must have had some
kind of record, we didn't see it because we didn't do the sentencing
part.)
I've heard all sorts of horror stories of juries going wild, people
who just weren't rational, etc. But, my experience was an amazing
and wonderful one. We worked together, carefully examined the
information given to us, and reached a decision.
Jon