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> Juries, widely trusted to impartially deliver justice, are the most familiar instance. Trusted by those that have not looked into whether this is actually th
by like_any_other 1y ago
> Juries, widely trusted to impartially deliver justice, are the most familiar instance.
Trusted by those that have not looked into whether this is actually the case. The first prime minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, was famously against trial by jury, because of how easily lawyers can abuse biases in multiracial societies, based on his first-hand experience [1].
A UK study found his experience is the norm, not the exception - Black and minority ethnic (BME) jurors vote guilty 73% of the time against White defendants, but only 24% of the time against BME defendants [2]. (White jurors vote 39% and 32% for convicting White and BME defendants, respectively. You read that correctly - Whites are also biased against other Whites, but to a much lesser degree)
Edit: To answer what is the alternative to juries: Not all countries use juries, in some the decision is up to the judge, and in some, like France, they use a mixed system of judges and jurors on a panel [3]. The French system would be my personal preference, with the classic jury system coming in second, despite my jury-critical post. Like democracy, it's perhaps the least bad system that we have, but we shouldn't be under any illusions about how impartial and perceptive a group of 12 people selected at random is.
[1] https://postcolonialweb.org/singapore/government/leekuanyew/lky2.html https://postcolonialweb.org/singapore/government/leekuanyew/...
[2] https://www.ucl.ac.uk/judicial-institute/sites/judicial-institute/files/diversity-fairness-in-the-jury-system.pdf https://www.ucl.ac.uk/judicial-institute/sites/judicial-inst... - page 165 (182 by pdf reader numbering), figure 6.4
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury
- mlinhares 1y agoAnd what is the other option? Just led the judge alone decide?
- kccqzy 1y agoYes I trust judges more than I trust juries. And it usually isn't a single judge. There is a panel of judges or en banc. And juries aren't universal either. Lots of other countries don't have juries but they have a fair and equitable justice system. Look up civil law vs common law.
- bluGill 1y agoI want the judge to keep the lawyers in check so they cannot. Judges are trustable because the jury limits their power. If I am a lawyer I know whothe judges are and it is to my advantage to figure out their bias (including judge shopping if there is more than one in the area), looking for embaressing things or blackmail material, what bribes they will accept (often in form of donation to a family charity) and so one. which is to say the reason I trust judges is the jury keeps them in check by ensuring there isn't value in the above corruption.
- lukan 1y agoWhat is the reasoning, judges are above racial bias?
- kccqzy 1y agoThey are more likely than juries to be above racial bias. Not 100% but I trust them more due to the training and education needed to become a judge.
- psunavy03 1y agoThis is known as a "bench trial" and is a legal concept.
- nottorp 1y agoBench trial and civil law are actually the most used legal systems worldwide, not jury trial and common law.
- wqaatwt 1y agoJury trials are not unique to common law systems, though. Many civil law systems either have lay judges or allow jury trials under certain circumstances. Of course you are not entitled to a jury trial in e.g. France unless you are accused of something very serious.
- tzs 1y agoOne possibility would be to use juries to just decide facts, then a panel of judges applies the law to those facts. If there are many factual disputes in a case maybe use multiple juries with each jury only deciding on a subset of the facts, chosen so that no jury sees the entire case. They are less likely to be biased if they don't see the entire case.
- digitalPhonix 1y agoThat statistic could also be the result of excessive prosecution against black/minorities and not necessarily just jury bias. (Which would also explain the white bias against whites)
- sebmellen 1y agoIf you're curious about this topic, I'd recommend you look up interviews with the jurors in the OJ Simpson trial. Many were black and by their own admission made their decision about OJ's guilt-based entirely on a feeling of racial justice. They considered it “payback.” https://youtu.be/BUJCLdmNzAA?feature=shared https://youtu.be/BUJCLdmNzAA?feature=shared
- dmonitor 1y agoOJ Simpson is was such a famous case that I'd be inclined to treat it as an outlier in many ways, not the norm.
- taeric 1y agoAgreed. Outliers are a thing. As is cherry-picking data to try and prove a point. Sucks, as this level of cherry-picking heavily biases me against the premise. If someone has a good data set, they don't need to drive anecdotes from the outliers. And if they are, is it an attempt to hide that the overall data paints a different picture?
- thephyber 1y agoBut I would argue that jury mentality is universal. Any juror who knows about the concept of jury nullification is more likely to use it when the defendant reminds them of themselves or when the prosecution has so vastly disproportionate resources over the defendant that the trial can’t possibly be fair.
- reverendsteveii 1y ago>I would argue that jury mentality is universal Then argue it, because that's a pretty large thing to say unsupported
- 16bitvoid 1y agoIn case I'm not the only ignorant one: BME = black and minority ethnic
- namlem 1y agoThat's not evidence of jury bias on its own. You have to control for prosecution rates and rates of actual guilt.
- onlyrealcuzzo 1y ago> (White jurors vote 39% and 32% for convicting White and BME defendants, respectively. You read that correctly - Whites are also biased against other Whites, but to a much lesser degree) This assumes that Whites and BMEs going to trial are equally likely to be guilty. Shouldn't we assume there would be some hidden delta?
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