Why do we have juries? Wouldnt professionals be better at determining innocence or guilt? They would, but our founding fathers knew of the power of jury nullifcation. this means, when a juror is asked to convict someone of a crime, he may decide that the law is unjust and return a verdict of "not guilty". so, when u are called for jury duty, and are selected to decide a drug-related case, all you have to do is say "not guilty", even if you are the only one. the other jurors can disagree, but even in the face of undeniable proof of guilt you cannot be compelled to change your vote. the jury's decision must be unanimous, so if you do this the trial must be redone. why? for every time someone does this, the cost of drug prohibition gets higher. trials are long and expensive, and if, say, 1/3 of juries had a member who refused to allow prohibition, the cost of prosecuting drug offenders just went up 33%! if enough people do this, a suspect could be found not guilty. if even more people do, it will be impossible to find a jury to convict drug offenders, and at least the domestic parts of the drug war will be over. the supreme court recognizes the right of juries to nullify laws, but at the same time the judge and attorneys cannot even mention it in court, and its illegal to hand out flyers outside a courthouse which inform jurors of this right. so, take matters into your own hands, and REFUSE TO CONVICT ALLEGED DRUG OFFENDERS.
This is one of the most unknown tools that we have to fight back. I would not take the chance that a "professional" is corrupt in a trial. More people to judge equals less chance of corruption, or bias in a case.
I agree 100% Think of Harriet Tubman. What she did was illegal but was it unlawful to help free slaves? Excellent site with many resources on law: Family Guardian
im tellin ya, if we could get all the potheads in america to intentionally get caught and demand jury trials we could clog the system up and itd cost the government BILLIONS (jury trials are expensive.) wed also need to demand prison over fines so theyd realize they cant lock up all of us. if only we could organize this. itd 100% work. im high as fuck right now lol but seriously itd work
oh, and next time you get busted, dont take their plea bargains. they hand them out to like 99% of people busted for possesion. they dont want to have to pay for a trial cuz they know they cant afford trials for all of us. they just want our money. more stupid laws = more people getting busted = more fines we choose to pay instead of prison = bigger government pay checks. bastards
very true. personally i think trials should be mandatory. plea bargains, combined with other tools, often force the innocent to accept punishment because they cant afford a trial. i personally know someone (he was actually my co-defendant) who did nothing wrong but was charged with hacking, he had to plead guilty and get probation cuz he couldnt afford a computer expert for a trial. of course, if our courts required actual proof of guilt, he wouldnt have to have an expert prove his innocence. but of course thats always the case. i was charged in the same case and even though i actually was guilty i got a lesser sentence than him because i threatened to take it to a trial and subpoena everyone involved, who were all government employees, in a 2 week long trial even though i had already admitted guilt volutarily on video tape. they did not want that to happen so they gave me half the sentence as their previous offer.
Prosecutors are the scummiest people on the planet. They turn peoples lives and games into a competition for victory, or for money. They are unconcerned with innocence or guilt, only with numbers.
It's a shame how few people know of this power. That is of course, because the court doesn't inform them of it, and it some places it's actually prohibited to tell the jury about nullification. On another forum I frequent there was a thread about jury duty and somebody mentioned how when he was on a jury there was some old guy that didn't want to vote guilty because he disagreed with the law and how he and the other jurors had to explain to him that it wasn't up to them to decide the law, they could only vote on whether or not he violated the law. When I pointed out he was wrong, because of the right to nullify, an argument ensued and just about everybody thought that I was full of shit. Why are people so willfully ignorant?
A guy I knew that was called for Jury Duty did say that he was against the pot laws, and was not chosen for the jury. The defendant's lawyer later mentioned to him that he would have preferred that my friend had just kept his opinion to himself, gone on the jury, and voted not guilty. I hate jury duty, I've been called and served, three times but a few years ago, with a doctor's note, I managed to be excused permanently, so I'll never be called again. What the fuck do I know about the law? They should have professionals who understand these things, not people who have no clue.
We need professional jurors, instead we force a lot of people to do it who are unwilling, underpaid, uninformed, biased in one way or another, and sometimes just plain stupid. Casey Anthony and O.J. are two famous examples of wrong verdicts, and it happens all the time even if we don't hear about it.
dude, the whole point of this thread is that thats a bad idea. if people dont want a law, they should be able to nullify it. people from the persons hometown should be able to decixe if ts a just application of the law and rule not only according to facts, but according to the law. THATS WHY WE HAVE JURIES, not some stupid fucking shit about it being impartial. and reasonable doubt is an important standard, at least with casey anthony there was no proof. would u trust our courts if they convicted people based on "probably guilty or or "most likely guilty"?? thats not enough proof to deprive people of their basic rights to liberty, property, or life. i know some assholes think that just because your arrested youre guilty, well the founding fathers said being arrested, indicted, having an attorney, even refusing to speak about the alleged offence COULDNT NOT EVEN BE CONSIDERED BY A JURY. and i think they had a good reason also, if your such a lazyass that you try to get out of jury duty or even admit you would nullify the law in question, yes we all know how easy it is, consider that its a rare opportunity to force a small bit of justice into our courts. especially if u know its a drug case, its just a straight dick move to deliberately get kicked out of it
noooo... no no no no no... if there are professional jurors, then that means that the prosecution or the defence will know who they are before the jury is selected. it severely limits the potential jury selection and puts big, shiny targets over their head with "for sale" printed in bright red. (edit not to mention that there would be more than one company that has a stable of jurors and those jurors might have a vested interest in playing to the company line instead of the pursuit of true justice. the fact that the jury is selected on an as-needed basis and is a random selection of regular citizens is one of the redeeming factors of jury trials. and if you want to sya "well, they won't sell out because that's illegal." well, people download music and that's illegal... pretty much everyone here smokes pot and that's illegal too... everyone has a price, my friend... every one of us has a price.
Except for the fact those cases were decided by evidence and justice was served exactly like it should have according to our system. Innocent until PROVEN guilty.
Depending on the case, the charges etc, how it went down.. whether it was bullshit or not... I'd basically become a mini defense lawyer in the deliberation room. Always hoped I'd get jury duty for a cannabis case, my number didn't get called last time so I'm good for another 5 years lol
Simpson was found not guilty because some of the mental retards on the jury did not understand DNA evidence. The judge was visibly shocked when the verdict was read.
It hasn't been proven to me that Casey Anthony did it. If I don't have 100% proof I refuse to offer up a person's life to the prison system for the rest of eternity. It is far better to let a guilty person go free than to send an innocent person to prison. Do I think she did it? Yeah, but that doesn't matter. I believe in God but I understand why Atheists don't.