Criminal Cases – heard in the Crown Court when a defendant pleads not guilty. The Judge oversees the legal aspects of the case. A jury must return a unanimous verdict if possible if not a majority verdict of 11 to 1 or 10 to 2 will be accepted providing the jury has discussed the case for at least 2 hours 10 minutes (the 10 minutes was originally for the walk between the jury box and the jury room)
Civil Cases – rare but can hear cases involving fraud, defamation of character or malicious prosecution. In a County Court only 8 jurors are used but the High Court requires 12.
Advantages of the Jury
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Public confidence General public are keen to keep the system. Ordinary people have a part to play in the justice system. Magistrates and judges tend to be white/middleclass.
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Open System of Justice. The system is accessible to all because professionals have to make sure the jury understands
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Jury Equity. A group decision gives fairer results Ponting’s Case (1984) A civil servant was charged under the old s2 of the Official Secrets Act 1991. He had leaked information on the sinking of the General Belgrano in the Falklands War to an MP. He pleaded not guilty saying it was in the public interest. Although the judge ruled there was no defence the jury refused to convict him.
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Ability to judge according to conscience. In R v Owen (1992) A lorry driver without a driving licence ran down and killed Owen’s son showing no remorse. He only serve one year in prison for a driving offence. Mr Owen injured him with a shotgun but despite evidence the jury acquitted him.
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Secrecy of the Jury Room. The Jury are free from pressure. In Bushell’s Case (1670) the judge would not accept that Quaker activists were not guilty of unlawful assembly and ordered the jury to reconsider giving them no food or drink. When they still refused to find them guilty he fined them placing them in prison until the fine were paid. On appeal it was held that jurors couldn’t be punished for their verdicts.
Disadvantages of the Jury
Incompetence of juries
Lord Denning in What Next in Law? – ‘jurors are summoned who are not sufficiently intelligent or educated to perform their task’ He went on to say that jurors should be selected in the same way as magistrates
The Roskill Committee – ‘random juries were out of their depth in complex fraud cases’ Jurors categorise their own confusion as reasonable doubt and are likely to acquit.
- Juries may not represent a cross section of the community
- No training apart from a short video and leaflets
- Some cases are complex
- Jury service is compulsory – some people might agree just to get away quickly.
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Verdicts do not have explanations so it is not possible to see how much discussion took place. The Contempt of Court Act 1981 (juries must not be questioned about their decision)
- juries may have sympathy with the defendant
- Juries acquit more defendants than magistrates. The Home Office Planning Unit suggested that acquittal is twice as likely.
- Ac Crown Court trial costs £7000 a day whereas the Magistrates Court costs £1000 a day
Bias
The jury may be biased for or against certain groups.
eg favour attractive members of the opposite sex or be prejudiced against the police in cases of malicious prosecution and false imprisonment
Juries seem to be prejudiced against newspapers in libel cases. £500000 awarded to Jeffrey Archer in 1987. In Sutcliffe v Pressdram Ltd 1990 Private Eye was ordered to pay £600,000 to the wife of the Yorkshire Ripper. Lord Donaldson described this as irrational asking for Judges to give juries more guidance on the amount to be awarded. The Courts and Legal Services Act now allows the Court of Appeal to reduce damages.
Manipulation of the Jury Service
Delaying tactics used:
- To put pressure on the CPS to reduce the charge
- Prosecution witnesses are more likely to fail to attend court or their recollections may be weakened
- Time spent on remand (with extra privileges) is taken off the final sentence
Nobbling
Nobbling led to the suspension of jury trials in terrorism cases in Northern Ireland
Reform
3 types of reform:
- complete abolition
- replacing them with one of a number of alternatives
- keeping juries but limiting their role
Abolition
Only 1% of criminal cases and all but a handful of civil cases involve a jury with no apparent ill effects.
Alternatives
(as in most civil cases)
Advantages – trials are quicker, cheaper, have less perverse verdicts, no nobbling, trained to evaluate cases, trained in racial awareness
Disadvantages – restricting social backgrounds (no knowledge of the background/problems of certain defendants), judicial bias, less public confidence
Advantages - balance of views, less prejudice
Disadvantage - expensive to train the extra Judges that would be needed
Used in Scandinavia. The lay people could be selected using the same method as for juries.
In Spain 9 people are used
The Auld Report 2001
- chosen because of entitlement to be on the electoral role rather than having your name on it
- smaller juries
- fewer disqualifications and excusals
- defendants losing some rights to be tried by jury
- greater support for jury members – summary of key facts
- overruling jury decisions and sending them to appeal if the judge thinks the verdict too perverse
- reducing random selection to make them reflect the community. Where race is likely to be an issue, ethnic minority groups should be represented.
- telling juries of defendants previous convictions
- juries should not have the right to acquit
- the Court of Appeal should have the right to investigate improprieties in the jury room
