Studied by 0 people
Looks like no one added any tags here yet for you.
what is the purpose of the jury?
to consider the facts of the case and reach a verdit based on those facts
are jurries in criminal or civil cases?
trick question - they can be in BOTH criminal and civil cases, but they are far more common in criminal cases.
what does “dikastai” mean with respect to early Greece juries?
Dikastai means “to ensure that only impartial jurors took place in the trial”
in ancient Greece trials, how many jurors would be involved?
could be 500 to 1000+ depending on the seriousness of the case. Majority rule would win in these cases
how did the ancient Greece voting disks work?
if the juror had the disk open, it meant a vote for guilty, but if the disk was turned to the closed position it meant a vote for innocent.
why did jurors in ancient greece use voting disks?
to provide some securty and subtlety to the juror’s votes
how does the juror process differ in criminal vs civil cases
besides the fact that juries are very rare in civil cases, in civil cases juries work by majority rule, when in criminal aases they usually need a unanimous verdict
what are petit jurries and how do they differ for grand jurries (also what countries have petit and grand juries?)
petit juries are the “average jury” that people think of. they consist of 10-12 peole are are used for both civil and criminal trials, and the proceedings are usually made public
the grand jury is for VERY serious criminla cases. they have 16-23 jurors, and proceedings are completely private
both of these are in the USA (canada does not have grand juries)
how many jurors do you need for a civil and criminal trial in Canada? (and how many jurors for a civil trial in USA?)
for a criminal trial in canada, you aim for 12 people, but NEED at least 10 people.
For a civil trial in Canada, you have approximately six jurors. in the States, you have at least 6 but no more than 12. the states is wayyy more lax on their jury size requirements
what are the two stages of the jury selection process?
out-of-court pre-trial process
in-court process (usually the day of the trial)
what is the out-of-court pre-trial process?
The out-of-court pre-trial process involves selecting potential jurors through a jury selection list
what “qualifications” must a juror have to be eligable to serve on a jury in canada?
must be a canadian citizen who is 18+
must be a resident of jurisdiction where crime was committed
must have NO unpardoned indictable offenses
how are people added to the juror list and randomly selected for jury duty?
People are added to the juror list from various sources such as voter registration lists, and they are randomly selected through a lottery system to ensure impartiality.
what is the exclusionary criteria for jurors and is it federally instated or provincially?
the juror exclusion criteria differs by province
in ontario, all police officers, lawyers, employees of the attorney general, and basically any occupation or group that might be biases to a certain side which would cause an issue with impartiality are excluded from being jurors
what is a “summons” and what stage in jury selection does it occur?
A summons is a legal document that notifies individuals that they have been selected for jury duty. It occurs during the initial out-of-court pre-trial process, informing potential jurors of their obligation to appear in court.
how many jurors in Ontario fail to appear in court after receiving a summons?
between 11%-21%
how many jurors get summoned?
many, and way more than the 12 that are ideal for the trial to occur. they summon a bunch of potential jurors then trim down and weed out jurors until they have 12 “good” jurors to serve
what is the in-court process of jury selection?
The in-court process of jury selection involves questioning potential jurors to determine their suitability for the case. This is done through voir dire, where both the prosecution and defense can challenge jurors for cause
what is voir dire?
A preliminary examination of potential jurors to assess their qualifications and biases for a specific case.
what does Voir Dire mean?
"to speak the truth" in Old French, referring to the process of questioning jurors.
what are premptory challenges and how does their occurance differ in Canada and the states?
a premptory challenge is a legal provision allowing attorneys to reject a certain number of potential jurors without stating a reason. this is still allowed in the states but is NOT allowed in CANADA.
what are the 5 stages of the Voir Dire process?
selection
pre-court selection process
questioning
the in-court process. the judge questions jurors to weed out incapable jurors (less about bias in this stage, more about capability)
mini openings
Prior to bias-related questioning, mini openings occur to possibly weed out further jurors.
this gives potentially jurors a little rundown of the case which may reveal to the jurors that they will have potential issues with being impartial
questioning
this is the main part of Voir Dire. an Attorney now questions portential jurors to try and reveal their biases
removal
attorneys make a request for biased jurors to be removed, but they have to have reasonably justified that the juror has bias and cannot be unbiased
what are the 4 types of biases talked about in class, and can you describe them?
interest prejudice
the juror has a direct interest or stake in the outcome of the case
generic prejudice
there are stereotypical attitudes about witnesses in the case, victims in the case, the defendant, etc…
basically any prejudice against any group of people in the case that removes impartiality
specific prejudice
this is personal knowledge of the case. this type of bias is not necessarily against a group of people, but is bias that is case specific
normative prejudice (AKA confomity prejudice)
a type of prejudice where ppl feel biases to side and uphold the values of their community. this is rooted in being prejudicial to uphold their inclusion in social groups
what were the 3 remedies of juror impartiality talked about in class?
adjourment
this is a delay of trial, and is more common with issues of publicity
change of venue
this is moving the trial to a new location
this is also done with publicity when a delay/adjourment does not suffice to improve impartiality (paul bernardo had this)
challenge for cause
removal of biases juror (this is the easiest method)
are premptory challenges and challenges for cause limited or unlimited?
premprtory challenges (even though they are not in canadian courts anymore, they’re still in US courts) have a limited number of challenges.
challenges for cause have a unlimited number of challenges
what is a batson challenge?
A legal challenge to the validity of a peremptory strike based on race, ensuring that jurors are not excluded based on discriminatory reasons.
what did the case of Batson v. Kentucky (1986) cause?
the establishment of the Batson challenge (the act of objecting the validity of a peremptory challenge , on grounds that the other party used it to exclude a potential juror based on race, ethnicity, or sex), which protects against racial discrimination in jury selection.
what are 3 reasons as to why the Batson challenge somewhat fails in its approach at reducing discriminatory juries
the Batson challenge is limited by the stages of jury selection that precede it
race-netural explainations
some potential jurors state that they can’t serve on a jury because they need to work to feed their family. While this reason is not specific to race, we do find that it is more common for those in low socioeconomic communties (likely visual minorities) to say this, which results in many juries being made up of retired rich white men
design flaw
the batson challenge focuses on reducing intentional discxrimination, but does not address unintentional discrimination (like talked about above)
when looking at Samuel R. Sommer’s paper that compared all white juries to diverse juries, what notable things do we see?
*the % of time racism was met with an objection was 22% in the diverse jury, and 100% in the all white jury. so the all white jury were objecting 100% of the time that they were possibly being racist
diverse group discussed more facts than the all white group
diverse groups had less factual inaccuracies than the all white group
diverse group had more mentions of racism than the all white group
diverse group metnioned more race-related issues than the all white group
what are jury instructurions and what are some issues with jury insturctions?
Guidelines are given to jurors by the judge, outlining the legal standards and principles they must follow when deliberating a case.
Some issues are the excessive length of the instructions and the complexity of the instructions
what are the types of jury instructions and what is which one about?
preliminary instructions
occurs prior to in-court day and summarize what the jury should be doing (fundamental principles), opening instructions, and trial procedure instructions
mid-trial instructions
basically tells jurors what they can and cannot let influence their decisions
final instructions
this talks about the deliberation instructions and rules of evidence.
what is the general process of jury deliberation?
juries are sequestered and deliberate
juries can possibly ask questions if needed
they arive at a verdict
the jury is released and verdit is presented
what is sequestering of a jury?
The practice of isolating jurors from the public and media during a trial to prevent outside influence on their decision-making.
what happens if juries can not come to a verdict after being sequestered?
adjurnemnt occurs
what happens if jurors have questions after being sequestered?
they will write down the question, some dude will take the written question to the judge, and if appropriate the judge with call all jurors back to the court and address the qustion, and then sequester them again after.
what were the two styles of jury deliberation talked about in class?
evidence-driven
where jurors carefully review the evidence presented, and put together conclusions and arguments based on the strength of evidence
verdict-driven
emphasis is put on reaching a verdict quickly, often leading to less thorough discussion of the evidence and perhaps a more biased conclusion.
what is group polarization in jury deliberation?
Group polarization in jury deliberation refers to the phenomenon where the final decision made by jurors is stronger than any of the individual views held by any individual juror the
what are the 5 theories that would explain goup polarizaiton in jury deliberation?
social comparison
upward social comparison - “they seem really smart, I’ll side with them”
downward social comparison
lateral social comparison
normative influence
conforming to what is considered the norm to "‘fit in’
confirmation bias
accepting arguments that confirm jurors pre-existing biases but disregarding information that does not confirm these beliefs
social identity theory
this is “group think”
group identity is important to us, which may cause us to make the group more extreme in order to be more distinct.
deindividuation
reduction in accountability can result in more extreme views
we lose our self-awareness and act in ways we wouldn’t normally
jury decision rates have been ______________
why?
decreasing;
due to plea deals, funding/time, and evidence
what was covid’s impact on court and jury trials?
COVID-19 significantly disrupted court proceedings and jury trials by causing delays, increasing reliance on virtual hearings, and affecting juror availability due to health concerns and restrictions.
what are the 4 talked about methodologies for conducting jury decision-making research?
mock juries
field studies and experiments
post-trial deliberation or surveys
archival records
what is the research methodology of mock juries and what are the pros and cons of mock juries
Mock juries involve simulating a trial with participants who act as jurors, allowing researchers to study decision-making processes in a controlled environment.
pros:
high level of experimental control
direct acess to viewing deliberations
cons:
potential relevancy issues due to mock juries lacking real stress/consequences like real trials do
also a potential relevancy issue due to mock juries usually drawing on students (who are perhaps more educated that regular juries made up of lay people)
mock jury studies showed that the more that jurors _____________, the more complex the deliberations becomes and the ________________________
spoke up and talked about the case; longer it took to reach a final verdict
what is the research methodology of field studies and what are the pros and cons of field studies?
Field studies involve observing actual jury deliberations in real court cases, providing insights into decision-making in a natural setting.
pros:
they’re real cases, so you can watch jurors acting with real consequences. basically the whole thing is “more real”
cons:
they require cooperation from the courts
there is WAY LESS OR NO CONTROL over what happens to the variables.
what were the results of Heuer and Penrod’s field study research that looked at juror note taking and question asking
Notetaking was not found to aid in memory BUT it did help jurors feel positively in control and satisfied
note taking was also not found distracting or influential in deliberation
Question asking did not turn up anything that attorneys already did not
in Moran & Comfort’s (1982) study involving surveying ex-jurors aboudt their expierences, how many replied to the mailed survey and what did results show about attitudes of conviction?
319/1500 responded to the surveys
male jurors who were more linline with ‘family values’, had lower income, and were more authoritarian were more likely to convict
female jurors that were more likely to convict were pretty much the same, except thery were found to be more empathetic despite convicting.
what is the research methodology of post-trial deliberation and/or surveys and what are the pros and cons of post-trial deliberation and/or surveys?
Post-trial deliberation involves collecting juror feedback after a trial has concluded, often through surveys or interviews.
pros:
data is collected on cases involving real juries
cons:
issues with cognitive biases and memory loss due to the post-hoc manner (after tial delay) that these serveys or ineterviws entale
what is the research methodology of archival analysis and what are the pros and cons of archival analysis?
Archival analysis involves examining existing records and documents related to past trials or jury decisions.
Pros:
Allows for the study of real cases without the influence of current biases
Cons:
Limited by the availability and accuracy of existing records, and may not capture juror perspectives.
also its purely observational, nothing can be manipulated or experimented with.
based on Klevin and Klatorin’s study (conducted with archival juror analysis), what did they note about juror diversity and its impact on verdicts?
racially diverse juries = more hung juries BUT only when the defendant was black. any other race of the defendant and no effect was found.
what are focal variables in jury research?
Focal variables in jury research refer to specific factors or characteristics that are the primary focus of study, such as juror demographics, case complexity, or evidence presentation. These variables TYPICALLY the independent variable but can also be the dependent variable
what are the primary focal variables of jury decision making research?
procedural characteristics
e.g. jury size, jury instruction, jury involvement
participant characteristics
characteristics of any party in the court (like jurors, judges, lawyers, defendants, plaintiffs, etc..)
case characteristics
e.g. case type, evidence quality, and complexity of the case (mock juror experiments will manipulate the strength of evidence for example and see how that effects the DV)
deliberation characteristics
juror interactions, preferences, thoughts and beliefs, and juror experiences in the trial and their influence on deliberation
Devine et al., (2001) conducted a meta analysis on jury decision making and found that 4 themes emerged. what are each of these themes?
decision-making models:
jururs often do not make decision in the manner intended by the courts
jurors do NOT withhold judgement before all facts are presented or disregard inadmissable evidence like they should. rather, instead, they work from a stance of morals and what is ‘right’, ‘wrong’, or ‘fair’ regardless of the law
outcome predictors
dispostional characterictis may predict jury outcomes better than juror verdict preferences
jurors personality and/or biases may have more impact in deliberation than their initial verdict/polled preference
the ‘liberation’ hypthesis
jury decisions are influenced by the quality and quantity of the evidence
the more ambiguous the evidence, the less jurors feel bound to the evidence and the easier it will be for jurors to side with other factors (like bias or succumbing to group polarization
infleunce of deliberaation process
deliberation processes can influence jury outcomes
jurors can “flip” jurors like inthe movie 12 angry men
how do evidentiary vs extra evidentiary types of evidence differ
Evidentiary types of evidence refer to information presented in court that is derived directly from the facts of the case, such as witness testimony and physical evidence.
In contrast, extra evidentiary types of evidence that have not been officially introducted into the case (like maybe what jurors hear outside of the court, or disallowed evidence by the judge that juries FAIL to regard)
which is more impactful, evidentiary or extra-evidentiary evidence?
evidentiary is more impactful. extra-evidentiary has only moderate impacts on the jury
a majority of jurors find what type of evidence the most important in their verdicts?
most jurors find physical evidence (in particular DNA evidence) the most impactful. obviously it should be stated that this type of evidence is evidentary and not extra-evidentiary
does eyewitness testimony crack the top 10 most influential sources of evidence according to jurors?
YES. eyewitness testimony is #10 but still in the top 10
what were the 3 sources of juror bias talked about in class?
pre-trial bais
bias due to outside influence against the case (perhaps publicitiy going around about the case)
cognitive bias
this is having an early decision/prejudice prior to coming to a formal verdict
this can cause a confirmation bias to occur
bias from external legal actors
external actors would be like expert witnesses. Sometimes, expert witnesses cause the “authority effect” to occur where jurors forget that the expert witness is still a human and can be wrong or biased, so they give the expert witness’ testimony a lot of credibility and influence.
what is implicit bais?
Implicit bias refers to the attitudes or stereotypes that affect understanding, actions, and decisions in an unconscious manner. It can lead jurors to make judgments based on preconceived notions rather than objective evidence.
anti-LGBTQ+ bais leads to more _______________
victim blaming
how does LGBTQ+ bias affect cases regarding sexual offences?
sterotypes facilitate the criminlization of LGBTQ+ individuals as homosexuality used to be viewed as deivent and hay people were viewed as sexual predators
this makes gay people more likely to be found guilty in cases regarding child sexual abuse, etc.…
what are the 3 types of homophobes and what types of questions could a lawyer ask in order to get a Voir Dire challenge for anti-LGBTQ+ bias?
the explicit homophobe (openly bias)
you can ask simply if they hate gay people. this would reveal a biased answer, but it is a ‘hard’ question so you might ask a ‘softer’ question like “would you be okay if a ger person move in next to you”. this is less emotionally charged and possibly upsetting for others to hear, but still reveals bias
the closeted homophobe (knowingly bias but refrains from expressing it)
you couldn’t ask the hard “do you hate gay people” question to this type of biased juror because they would hide their answer (possibly due to social norms). as a result you would have to ask proxy questions that indirectly gauge their comfort level with LGBTQ+ individuals, such as "How do you feel about same-sex couples raising children?" or “do you have any close gay or lesbian friends?” This could reveal underlying biases without directly confronting them.
implicit homophobes (does not konw that they are homophobic
obviously ‘hard’ questions won’t work becaus they don’t consciously hold bias or likely do not belive they are bias, so you would once again have to ask proxy questions like "Do you think being gay is a choice?" or "What are your thoughts on LGBTQ+ rights?" to uncover unconscious biases.
what types of implicit bias interventions do we have in the CJS (or that we should have) and why don’t we just use Voir Dire to strike every bias juror?
we simply can’t Voir Dire strike every single biased person (even though we have unlimed Voir Dire challenges) due to everyone basically having some sort of explicit or implicit bias. as a result we have created interventions to help aid in reducing baises
there are 4 types of interventions we talked about in class:
Jury Orientation
in this, we tell jurors that they should be open-minded and less biased. it's not super effective, but it can help. we can also include the invitations for IAT tests to make jurors more aware of their biases so they can keep them in check for the trial
Jury selection
we can use Voir Dire challenges during jury selection, but we can also build salience by bringing to light the fact that the case will involve themes like LGBTQ+ factors so jurors can know what to expect and check their baise when observing the trial
Jury Instruction
we can instruct the soon-to-be jurors not to be biased (again, not effective), so we could (and must) make detailed and defined instructions for jurors to not let their biases impact them. examples could be presenting PowerPoint videos on bias
Expert Testimony
we can bring in expert witnesses to explain to jurors the impact of explicit and implicit bias and help them better understand that they might have their own implicit biases
what are IAT tests?
Implicit Association Tests, which measure the strength of associations between concepts and evaluations or stereotypes.
what obstacles are posed that hinder our use of implicit bias interventions on jurors?
resources
money, technology, time
hesitation
we are hesitent of using these interventions in the chance that they will make the issue worse by giving them a false sense of security in their neutrality and thinking that they don’t have biases, causing htem to confidently disregard their own baises
lack of understanding
even criminal justice professionals are not fully informed and may not know about how to go about reducing biases
what are the role of police in court?
act as witnesses
eye witnesses
expert witnesses
discuss evidence
why might a police officer be a defendant in court?
police misconduct
abuse of authority
brutality
unlawful killing of individuals
how does police legitimacy affect jury decision making
the omre legitimate we view police as an insitituion, the more credability we are going to give police officer’s testimony as both an eye-witness and expert witness
Newton-Small (2016) study outlined the effect of anti-police bias, revealing what?
all white jurors felt that the case was clear cut and the officer delivered the evidence well
black jurors felt reasonable doubt and struggled to trust the evidence given by the cop. they also struggled to give it as much weight as the white jurors did
why is the anti-police bias growing, especially in white jurors?
Increased media coverage of police misconduct, social movements advocating for racial justice, and public awareness of systemic inequalities contribute to the growing anti-police bias.
neuroscientific evidence is ____________________
becoming more common in the court
how does neuroscience influence jurors?
its complex. early findings showed that jurors were more likley to believe mental disorder to be present and infleunetial if an expert witness testified to this alongside neuroimaging. BUT newer research says that these findings are insignificant in final verdicts or even actually proves to be a double edged-sword.
in Schweitzer and Nunez (2018) article, what were the 10 most influential pieces of evidence found?
DNA
fingerprints
weapon
video records
crime-scene photos
gunshot residue
other bodily secretions
video confessions
forensic expert testimony
eyewitness
Bella is collecting old jury trial records from legal firms to use as data for her study. Which of the research methodologies is she using?
archival research methodology.
many researchers have found ________ evidence to outweigh all other types of evidence hwen it comes to jury decision making
DNA
which of the following best describes extra-evidentiary evidence:
evidence that is considered admissible in court
admissible evidence that comes to light during hte trial only
evidence that is not admissible in court (e.g., hearsay evidence)
non-physical forms of evidence (e.g., eyewitness testimony)
evidence that is not admissible in court (e.g., hearsay evidence)
which of the following roles might a police officer play in court:
eyewitness
expert witness
defendant
all of the above
all of the above.
