danivon wrote:I do not like the US system of Jury selection, where the lawyers get to try and shape the eventual panel from a larger group, and I get the impression that often it is used to 'test' their arguments and approaches (subtly). It also seems to me to put far too much focus on individual jurors and potential jurors, before the trial even begins,eand that raises concerns for me about jurors being under pressure.

I think you are misunderstanding how vior dire works. Typically it is a series of questions like do you know either attorney, the Defendant or any of the witnesses. Have you, or anybody close to you, been involved in a crime (in this case it would include questions of assault, murder, been profiled). If yes to any of those questions, will it interfere with your ability to make a decision. Is there any other reason you feel you shouldn't serve on the jury.

First, the Judge would strike anybody for cause which means there is some reason the Court recognizes that the individual will not be unbiased. Then each side gets a very limited number of strikes to get rid of somebody who they feel is biased. For example, here in PA, each side gets a number of strikes equal to half the final jury. So in the instant case, each side would have had 3 strikes

Just out of curiosity, how is it done over there?

In Florida, in the Zimmerman trial, the voire dire process took several days over two rounds, and the legal teams had more 'strikes' than there were jurors (10 each from a pool of 30 who were not rejected for cause) to arrive at a jury of 6 with 4 alternates.

Here (England & Wales) there is not the same level of selection. A juror can be rejected for cause only, and I think the criteria are different. Our juries are 12 strong. We also would not be allowing jurors to tell all kinds of details to the press as soon as the trial is over.

Looking at how selection works in this and othe US trials, I get the disntinct impression that the questions the legal teams use certainly are about more than just removing bias, but about trying to lay breadcrumbs and, to be frank, to try and retain any bias towards them if possible.

In California in criminal cases there are 10 peremptory challenges (more for capital cases) for each side. Also voters sometime ago passed a proposition that only allows questions relating to bias. You're not supposed to precondition the jury with questions relating to evidence in the case but given that the facts of the case dictate what kind of biases a jury might have, this tends to be a fine line (and of course lawyers will do what they can to plant seeds in the jury's mind as early as possible that they think will be beneficial to their side)We have 12 jurors too.
I'm not sure exactly why you think your system is better, Dan. The reality is that some jurors are not forthcoming about their biases or they will say they can be fair and impartial. If you just allow challenges for cause you're putting an awful lot of responsibility in the judge to figure out if a juror is biased or not (and if a juror is willing to lie about anything in their background that indicate bias, then the judge has no reason to dismiss the juror) whereas with peremptory there is a much better chance that attorneys can get rid of jurors who are hostile to their side (they can look at their job, their demeanor, their eagerness to get on the jury, whether they seem to like/dislike defendant or defense counsel or the prosecutor, whether they are laughing at the prosecutor's jokes, whatever). It really is better at getting a less biased jury, at getting rid of jurors whose biases are hidden, assuming competent attorneys.

no lawyer here but i did just have that jury summons I reported to.
In New York State we have 12 jurors (that is the "standard" in the US, I understand Florida is one of only a few that are different but depending on the crime, they too sometimes have 12)
Normally the court will bring in anywhere from a hundred people to several hundred people at a time depending on the caseload and the case. In my situation, we had 4 large trials to get jurors for. I'm guessing we had just shy of 500 jurors on Monday morning, I was part of the largest pool, they took well over half, probably 300+ and the others had about 50 or so per pool. Mine was so much larger because it was a sensational case, triple murder/arson that of course made the headlines for quite some time in the community.

We all went to the court room and they gave us a brief synopsis of the case at hand. They explained to us just what Freeman mentioned above (if we knew the defendant, knew the judge or lawyers, etc)
He then asked us to raise our hands if we had any really good reasons to be excused (I would say about 2/3 raised their hands at that time) and one by one they had us go to the jury deliberation room where we had the Judge, both sets of lawyers and the defendant seated. We were now apart from the rest of the jury pool and were asked why we felt we should be excused.

I mentioned the first reason for me is I could not afford to take the expected 3+ weeks off without pay (the court in New York pays you I think something like $40 a day, less than minimum wage and they do not even validate our parking!) they could care less about financial hardship, they didn't care about that reason in the least! Well, I did mention I had several reasons to be excused, I went into the others and was let go immediately ...my brother had once been shot and I knew how the court disallowed a lot of information I thought important, they hide information from the jurors. I also told them i recalled this particular case quite well and even mentioned the defendant was adopted if I recalled (I was right), I said there was no way i could be objective and I was let go. No way anybody would want me on the jury!

Turns out, of the 300ish people, they selected only TWO that first day! This was before the layers even got to use their strikes! It took until Thursday to pick the 12 people for the jury!

I said there was no way i could be objective and I was let go. No way anybody would want me on the jury!

Yes, no argument there.
:)

and I was quite adamant as well, hard to believe this, but I was being stubborn and even a bit obnoxious! ....me?

No way was I going to serve on that jury, no freaking way and I made that feeling well known!
and as your winkie notes, I agree, no lawyers want ME on any jury!

freeman3 wrote:I'm not sure exactly why you think your system is better, Dan.

Well, for one thing it's a lot quicker to get a jury, and you don't start off with lawyers asking questions with the possibility of helping their case. It also means we get a more random selection of people on the jury. If you get rid of all the people who (as in Tom's case) can't afford to do it, or can find ways to get out of it, you end up with a restricted pool. It becomes less a case of 'peers'.

Also, there is no way that you can arrive an an 'unbiased' jury, even with selections including vior dire. Some people are better liars than others (and the best liars you really don't want to be over-represented). I think it's better to accept that (barring obvious bias or over-familiarity with the case, which are cause), and concentrate more on getting jurors to overcome their bias than it is to pretend you can eliminate it.

We have a different system. Another difference to yours (a big one), is that we do not require jury unanimity. If a jury cannot decide 12-0 in one direction, a verdict can be given on a majority of 10-2 (although they will be asked to try to get unanimity first).

Tom - I agree with you and RJ that you probably would not have made a good juror. However:

1) the money - it should be at least, if not more than, minimum wage to serve on a jury. You had good reason to not want to do it, but perhaps if they didn't invite hundreds of people to spend ages getting down to the actual number, the cost saving could be used to increase the rate.

2) your objection to information being withheld is understandable, but it's something that should be dealt with by explaining to jurors what their purpose is, what the laws of evidence are, and why sometimes that information may be prejudicial. The point is indeed to be objective, which also means not having irrelevant (ina legal sense, not simply your opinion) information clouding your judgement as a juror. That's why a lot of Trayvon Martin's past was not admissible - because just as you would not have known about it until it came out, neither would Zimmerman at the time of the incident - unless there is evidence that he could have done.

3) your prior knowledge was the only real 'cause', and of some importance.

The other two could be surmounted - by them improving the system and by you being prepared to try being objective.

in no order of reply

agreed, I would be a horrible juror, honestly so!

regarding wages, what would be so bad about having no pay or reduced pay for the selection process but should you serve, THEN you get paid a better wage? I would also prefer a "professional" jury pool! Get people working, get some savvy jurors who know the score, etc. I know the reasons against this but MYSELF, I would love this to be the case.

As far as lawyers asking questions, as far as my preliminary portion went ONLY the judge asked the questions! I do believe the lawyers get to ask questions (at least later) but those questions are limited in scope to what can be asked so they certainly are not tainting things at all.

Info being withheld, again, I understand the reasons for this but simply knowing how much is withheld and how much I feel is important to the case certainly matters to me. You want me to determine someones fate, then I want the facts, let me determine if they have any part in the case at hand.

as far as my knowledge being the only reason to dismiss me, yes that might be the biggest reason but each of these all play a part that certainly add up. You really want someone who doesn't want to be there? Someone who assumes facts are being hidden from him so he attempts to read between the lines? We all know I'm opinionated, yet another reason to get rid of me! I think it all added up to them not wanting me in the least.

In California you get paid $15 per day for service after the first day and 34 cents per mile traveled. Hey, it wasn't that long ago that it was only $5 a day. That tends to really the composition of juries (especially for long trials) , because if you work in the private sector you may not get paid for jury service (or only for a certain period of time) But even if you got paid minimum wage, that is a very significant hardship for someone to be on a long trial who makes a lot more than the minimum wage. So retirees, students, the unemployed and government workers are not under-represented on juries... The economics of serving on juries probably skews their composition (as opposed to the general population) more than any other single factor

GMTom wrote:and I was quite adamant as well, hard to believe this, but I was being stubborn and even a bit obnoxious! ....me?

No way was I going to serve on that jury, no freaking way and I made that feeling well known!
and as your winkie notes, I agree, no lawyers want ME on any jury!

Maybe Zimmerman's lawyers?

You'd be a good guy to share a fox hole with.

It goes on too long, but the first couple of minutes are cute.

http://www.dailydot.com/lol/kids-react- ... cial-race/

what a shock--minority juror was the one that originally voted for 2nd degree murder and then was apparently "convinced" by the other five white jurors that she was wrong. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/2 ... d%3D349412

freeman3 wrote:what a shock--minority juror was the one that originally voted for 2nd degree murder and then was apparently "convinced" by the other five white jurors that she was wrong. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/2 ... d%3D349412

Can't we be proud that the jury system worked as intended? Zimmerman wasn't convicted on sentiment, but has been freed based on evidence.

36-year-old Puerto Rican nursing assistant, Maddy was the only minority on the six-person jury. She admitted she was the juror who originally wanted to convict Zimmerman of second-degree murder, but eventually realized that the evidence didn't support a guilty verdict with respect to his claim of self-defense.

"I was the juror that was going to give them the hung jury. I fought to the end," she said. "That's where I felt confused, where if a person kills someone, then you get charged for it. But as the law was read to me, if you have no proof that he killed him intentionally, you can't say he's guilty."

Do you think we would have a better society if decisions were made based on Maddy's preconceived notions as opposed to evidence and the law? Does your sympathy for Martin and his family override the core principles that you learned in law school? I'm still amazed that the ACLU is angry about this decision.

Jury dynamics are often not very pretty. Many times jurors simply get worn down by other jurors. One minority juror, a nursing assistant-- probably not very sophisticated or well-educated-- trying to argue against the other jurors? She says she tried to hold out. She did not have a chance.
The white jurors saw the case through the prism of their experiences and the minority juror saw it through her experiences. I may have told this story before, and if so, please excuse my telling it again. Probably about 15 years ago I had a civil rights trial in downtown Los Angeles. Not the biggest case in world, a couple of school cops roughed up my client, a Hispanic immigrant in a routine traffic stop. My jury was composed of 4 black and Hispanic women and 8 Asian and White jurors. In California in civil cases you need to 9 out of 12 jurors to get a verdict. In this case, there were 8 jurors who wanted to find for the defendant and four for the plaintiff.I would up winning the case. How? Those four minority jurors were not going to give in --ever. They forced those 8 jurors who had no sympathy for my client.at all to award him money. And that judge, which I never seen done before or since, had the jurors fill out comments. Those 8 jurors who did not want to give anything could not stand me, said really harsh things--they were so mad that they had to award my client money (well, maybe, they did not like me either). And if you want to know how I know about the jury breakdown I talked to the jury after the verdict and the jurors comments pretty much tracked what the jurors i talked to said happened in deliberations.
So, yes, the jury system is a great system and having jury trials every day is part of the bedrock of our society. But it would have been nice to have expectations confounded and to have had a white juror been the one who was the hold-out. Alas...

freeman3 wrote:So, yes, the jury system is a great system and having jury trials every day is part of the bedrock of our society. But it would have been nice to have expectations confounded and to have had a white juror been the one who was the hold-out. Alas...

The confounding results of the jury trial:

1. Zimmerman was found not guilty, in spite of the media campaign to go after him. He was "white," even though he has a Latina mother and defines himself as "Hispanic." That's what he was on the census. So, why did the media (NYT, CNN) even go so far as to describe him as "a white Hispanic?" Because they wanted to make this about race. The President is not a "white African-American" is he?

2. The jury is somehow in fear for their lives. Why is that?

3. Zimmerman rescues some family from a burning car and they can't give a press conference because . . . they're in fear for their lives.

4. Liberals keep bemoaning Trayvon did not receive justice. Neither did Zimmerman. He would not have been charged except for the political machinery and the media arrayed against him. Even after all of that, the verdict is still "unfair." The problem, as freeman3 illustrates, "innocent until proven guilty" does not apply in this case. They all know Zimmerman was guilty. Evidence? Who needs it?

Now, this video is harsh, but if half of this came into the trial, well, there would have been no trial. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ebu6Yvzs4Ls