Real Juries

Abstract

The elaborate efforts of the legal system to control and channel jury behavior reveal a mistrust of an institution that also attracts extravagant praise. We look at the jury by examining research on real juries drawn from archival studies and posttrial surveys and interviews, as well as from the deliberations of real juries. We show how the methods used by courts to gather and select jurors affect the representativeness and legitimacy of the jury. We also examine the evidence underlying skepticism about jury verdicts and decision making, focusing on cases that pose special challenges to jurors, particularly those involving complex evidence, legal complexity, and the death penalty. We then consider how optimal jury trials can be achieved. Even twelve experienced judges, deliberating together, would probably not function well under the conditions we impose on the twelve inexperienced laymen [Judge Jerome Frank, Courts on Trial (1949), p. 120]. Juror #4 (discussing the testimony of an expert physician in a medical malpractice case): What I would like to have is 40 [specialists] and show them the [test results] and okay, get a survey and is this significant or is this not significant and would they have [done what the defendant did]? [Deliberating juror from the Arizona Filming Project (Diamond et al. 2003)]

Psicologia e deliberação legal no tribunal do júri brasileiro: proposição de uma agenda de pesquisa

“…Os pesquisadores devem estar atentos à relação validade interna e externa de seus estudos, de forma a possibilitar o desenvolvimento teórico adequado à realidade jurídica e sócio-cultural brasileira. Na literatura alguns autores vêm apontando a importância de diversificação metodológica para se envolver jurados reais nas pesquisas de psicologia da deliberação legal (Diamond & Rose, 2005) e outros discutem a validade dos procedimentos experimentais nestes estudos (Bornstein, 1999;Kerr & Bray, 2005). Cabe ao leitor aprofundar-se no debate.…”

Jury Systems Around the World

“…Most scholars who study jury competence in the U.S. context reach generally favorable conclusions, finding that most jury verdicts are solidly grounded in the trial evidence. The strength of the evidence in the case-whether it is evaluated by the judges or the jurors-is the prime determinant of jury verdicts (Garvey et al 2004, Eisenberg et al 2005, Hans et al 2003, Diamond & Rose 2005.…”

“…These methods generally reinforce the importance of evidence to the jurors but also have identified some problematic areas, such as pretrial publicity (Steblay et al 1999), expert evidence (Vidmar & Diamond 2001), statistical and scientific testimony (Kaye et al 2007), and death penalty trials (Vidmar & Hans 2007). Some jurors also experience difficulty comprehending judicial instructions in the law (Diamond & Rose 2005).…”

“…Diamond & Rose's (2005) excellent, comprehensive survey of scholarship on real juries analyzed U.S. research, in part because the research with actual jurors is restricted in many other countries. Likewise, the work included in other recent summaries of jury research, such as Devine et al's (2001) survey of 45 years of research on deliberating juries (which included both real juries and experimental juries), is nearly all work on the American jury.…”

“…Hans see Diamond & Rose 2005, Munsterman et al 2006. Jury selection has been extensively studied in the United States (Vidmar & Hans 2007), less so in other countries that generally do not allow as much latitude in the selection of trial jurors.…”