Jury was not allowed to read academic paper

Discussion in 'Law & Justice' started by kazenatsu, Oct 27, 2022.

  1. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    Actually I'm expecting you to rely on people who know what they're doing,not make the law a mishmash of individual opinion without regard to precedent or the separation of powers.

    Not without repealing the 6th amendment.

    That's why we have judges. They make judgements.
     
  2. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Gee, it's a wonder we see the need to have any jury at all.

    There's little point in having a jury if they are not truly the ones making the decision and their decision-making process is strictly controlled.
    It's things like this that (in my opinion) tear away at Constitutional protections and make some of the protections partially meaningless.
    We have to ask what the full reason of having a jury is in the first place.

    You do realize that's the reason there is a jury? Because we as a society do not trust leaving the decisions all up to the judge and prosecutor.
     
  3. MuchAdo

    MuchAdo Well-Known Member

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    Chief Justice McCallum said she had warned the jurors "at least 17 times" during the trial not to try to find out more about the case other than what they heard in court.

    "You must not try to undertake your own research," she said she told them.

    "You must rely exclusively on the evidence you hear in this courtroom.

    "If you are learning something about this trial, and I'm not there, then you should not be doing it."

    From doing further reading, the academic paper had something to do directly with the trial which is why the judge said what I quoted above in italics.
     
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  4. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    They didn't find out about the case. The information that they brought in was not about that specific case.

    Your arguments seem to be confusing together two different things.

    Having information about the story and facts in that specific case is a different thing from having information about the type of issue that the specific case involved.

    The issue was not information about whether that specific woman was lying, but was information about whether other women (not involved in the trial) lie in similar situations.

    In logic, I believe what is happening here is something called an equivocation fallacy.
    It's unclear whether the judge was too stupid to understand the difference, or whether she actually believed that specific separate category of information was also inappropriate.
     
    Last edited: Dec 4, 2022
  5. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    The reason behind having a jury is to get an impartial opinion of the evidence presented in court. It is not to launch private investigations of their own (the province of the executive branch) nor is it to elicit outside sources of either fact or opinion (the province of the lawyers). The issue is not whether we trust the judges or prosecutors.

    The jury are members of the judicial branch while they serve. They are not detectives. Muddying the water in the way you suggest paves the way to mistrial. You would take an already ponderous and cumbersome system and add meaningless complications to it.
     
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  6. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    It is inappropriate and prejudicial to read a paper on 'whether other women lie' when the only germane fact is whether THIS woman lied THIS time. I guess you don't get that.
     
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  7. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The statistics on how often a large group of other women lie has a bearing on the probability that this woman is lying.

    All "evidence" is "prejudicial". Some of it rightly so. (I mean certain types of "prejudice", depending on your definition of the word, can rightfully be part of the evidence the jury should hear)

    Can you explain what exactly you mean by "prejudicial", because it is not exactly clear, and we can't really have a logical debate about this unless you give a more clear definition of what you are talking about.

    I do agree that it is very likely that a judge would find this to be "prejudicial" (in the sense of not being willing to allow it because it may have an effect on the jury despite the judge thinking it should be irrelevant to proper decision making), but that is exactly the problem and does not mean their (the judge's) decision would be logically correct.
     
    Last edited: Dec 6, 2022
  8. MuchAdo

    MuchAdo Well-Known Member

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    CNN —
    An Australian judge has dismissed a 12-member jury deliberating a high-profile rape verdict after it was revealed a juror conducted research into the allegations and took that information into the jury room.

    The folder was not opened but staff conducted an online search of the article’s title and found it included analysis of the reasons for false sexual assault complaints and skepticism in the face of true ones.


    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-28/bruce-lehrmann-mistrial-and-rules-for-juries-in-act/101584606

    As demonstrated in yesterday's mistrial, jurors must not conduct independent research.

    Chief Justice McCallum told the court she had repeatedly warned the jury they were not to be detectives.

    Instead, a juror's knowledge of a case should be restricted to what they have been told and shown in court.

    The ACT Jury Handbook had this to say:

    "You must not make any enquiries or conduct any research of your own on matters relating to the trial. Do not make searches online or visit any place relevant to the case. While you are on the jury, you should minimise your use of social media such as Facebook
    ."


    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-28/bruce-lehrmann-mistrial-and-rules-for-juries-in-act/101584606


    The judge in this case made the right decision.

    The juror in question was obviously investigating the case and looking for information related to things going on in the trial or looking for answers. The prosecution’s main position was she was lying. If you think looking up statistics/research related to woman lying about rape isn’t related to this trial, then you are not engaging in critical thinking. The juror should have only been looking at information that was brought up in the trial, not outside information.

    If there was a murder trial where the prosecution stated there was no way the weapon used killed anyone — let’s say an apple peeler. If an juror went out and searched this independently and found there have been no cases of murder by apple peeler, this could sway his own and the decisions of the others. They have to stick to evidence presented in the trial. How the apple peeler ended the persons life.

    How many times are going to try to dazzle us with your many different fallacies that you use to tell people they are wrong. In this case the information sought out was directly related to the prosecution’s stance.

    I believe a judge is in a much better position than some random know-it-all on the internet to decide whether a juror has broken the rules. Who are you to call anybody stupid, of course unless it’s a professional female. You should be happy though because the case has been totally thrown out because the raped woman has become mentally unstable and they feel it would be to her detriment to carry on. Yet, another woman destroyed by a rapist.
     
  9. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    Not really. Statistics don't apply to individual cases. Whether other women lie or not has no bearing on her actions.

    First off, let's dispense with the idea that this paper was any kind of evidence at all. It was not introduced by either side. Neither side got a chance to review or rebut it. It is the product of a juror investigating the case, usurping the prerogative of the executive branch.

    In this case, it predisposed the juror to have an opinion about whether the woman was telling the truth without allowing anyone to rebut what he was using as evidence. The paper was written to advocate a given point of view. It encouraged him to prejudge the woman's testimony before hearing it.

    The fact that the judge doesn't agree with your position does not make his decision illogical. In point of fact it is your idea that is less than sound. Presumably he knows what will lead to a mistrial and is trying to avoid that.
     
  10. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I do not believe that is true.
    One example is a DNA test, where an expert testifies there is only a 1 in 10,000 chance that the DNA sample collected as evidence could have come from some other person who is not the defendant. In the past when DNA tests were less accurate, it might have only been a 1 out of 30 chance. That was not proof, but was still seen as supporting evidence.
    Why do you think statistics should apply to evidence but not to witness testimony?
    If for example a witness says she is "pretty sure" she saw the face of the suspect, but it was dark and she can not be completely sure, wouldn't it be fair to bring out some statistics about the accuracy of witnesses being able to identify a face?
     
  11. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I would argue that it SHOULD have predisposed the jury to have an opinion. Your point about the other side not having an opportunity to rebut it is valid, but here are two more points to consider. Now that the paper had come to the attention of the judge, they could have at that point given the prosecutor the chance to try to rebut it. Why did they need to dismiss the jury at that point? And is there anything the prosecutor could have even done to logically rebut that paper? That seems unlikely to me, since the paper mostly contained statistics from studies. I doubt the prosecutor would be able to find some other statistical study disagreeing with it.
     
  12. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    Physical evidence is objective. It's either there or it's irrefutably not. Even in the days you cite a maybe 1 in 30 chance, the DNA could have ruled the defendant out.

    And that's the problem. This paper was not testimony of any kind nor was it entered into evidence. It could not be challenged by either side. In essence the juror was impeaching the witness without rebuttal.

    If she said pretty sure on the stand, go with that. What's the problem? Let the lawyers argue about reliability. The jury is supposed to listen to the case as it is presented. It's not that hard of a concept to grasp.
     
  13. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    First off, it's not fair to force the lawyers to rebut anything off the cuff. That's why they have the discovery process.

    The prosecutor would need time to review what to say and how. How would it be fair to the jury to halt their lives while the lawyers dither?

    I'm pretty sure the prosecutor could find experts with contrary opinions. Or find a way to attack the means of gathering the statistics. Possibly argue about what they mean. There are all kinds of ways to attack statistics. And I'm sure he could find a study that reached other conclusions, much like the 'hammers are more dangerous than handguns' argument of the NRA apologists.
     
  14. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I understand that, and your argument there is not invalid. But the issue is, you want to concentrate the decision-making power all into the hand of the defense lawyer to decide what information is presented, and all into the hand of the judge to decide which of that information is fair to be shown to the jury.
    The jury is there to decentralize the decision-making power, but that may not be so effective or legitimate if they have no control over the information from which they are able to derive their decision.

    Either way, there is potential for unfair things.
     
  15. MuchAdo

    MuchAdo Well-Known Member

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    You do realize that the juror was in their decision making phase. The actual presenting of evidence was finished, final summaries had been made. The article in question was found during jury deliberations. You can’t restart an active phase of a trial to introduce information that a juror has smuggled in. The jury has to derive their decisions from the evidence presented during the trial, not evidence that they present to each other that is not from the trial. It would have been unfair of the judge to allow the jury to continue deliberating after it was discovered information that wasn’t presented in the trial was being smuggled in and discussed. Especially, after the jury had said they couldn’t decide and the judge told them to go deliberate some more. The article could have swayed the jury unfairly. Nobody should get convicted or go free based on evidence that has not been presented in a trial.
     
  16. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    So your solution to what you see as potential arbitrariness on the part of a judge is a reason to discard precedent and established law? Each case should be decided solely by the jury without regard to what has gone before or even what the law actually says? That's pretty much the path to vigilante justice. Kinda the opposite of what you apparently think should happen here. The system exists for a reason.
     
  17. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'd say it's debatable how far back, and how fully that precedent goes, and to what extent it is established law.

    You have to concede there is an issue here, and whenever a judge can prevent a jury from being allowed to have information, that can be a slippery slope.

    It would be an argument of extremes to say it's just a settled issue that judges can block information from a jury and so none of this is an issue at all.

    I think in countries like the U.S., the right of an individual to jury trial is viewed as sacrosanct, and so it's very concerning when a judge can block information to a jury, especially when some could argue that information could be relevant or possibly should be considered when trying to come to a proper decision.

    Imagine you are a member of a jury trying to make a decision to decide someone's fate, and you are not even told that there is information the judge is not allowing you to hear. You have no idea what you are not being told.
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2022
  18. FreshAir

    FreshAir Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    juries are not allowed to research the case outside of court.... period
     
  19. Imnotreallyhere

    Imnotreallyhere Well-Known Member Donor

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    But it is a settled issue and has been for a very long time. Judges have always been able to disallow evidence. They've always been permitted to dismiss juries and individual jurors.

    Evidently the defendant's lawyer didn't think it was relevant. Why should the judge?.

    [/quote]Imagine you are a member of a jury trying to make a decision to decide someone's fate, and you are not even told that there is information the judge is not allowing you to hear. You have no idea what you are not being told.[/QUOTE]

    I also have no idea if the cake for the defendant's fifth birthday was chocolate or angel food or perhaps lemon, but you go with what you've got.

    The system is not perfect. No system is. The tweaks you propose would make it much worse. You would take power from a judge, who at least knows the law, and police, who enforce it, and give that power to a jury who are not qualified to do do either job.
     
  20. Melb_muser

    Melb_muser Well-Known Member Donor

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    Good post. But we don't know for sure if he was a rapist or not. That was the purpose of the trial, surely?
     
  21. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    A trial will not determine whether he committed the crime or not. But it will help determine the probability that he committed the crime, and whether he should be punished.
    That of course assumes everyone has all the relevant information available to make the decision, and that they will correctly and logically interpret all that information, which is not necessarily always the case.
    You can see why a judge withholding information from a jury is so problematic. If the judge is making the correct decision, everything is fine; but if withholding that information is controversial, it could kind of defeat some of the point of having a jury in the first place. The jury isn't the one truly making the decision if relevant information was purposefully withheld from them.
     
  22. Melb_muser

    Melb_muser Well-Known Member Donor

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    I will trust the Judge's judgement over yours, thanks.
     
  23. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    "I trust big government. There is no problem."

    "There must be some good reason they are doing this."
    (Isn't that what a woman in an abusive relationship tells herself?)

    If you trust the judge so much, why even have a jury?
     
    Last edited: Dec 16, 2022

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