The performance by jurors depends a great deal on their intelligence, in that they have to deeply understand and accept the difference between the law and the desired result. Not an easy distiction to uphold, even for Mensa types.

Having professional jury panels has been said to invite corruption. Since the jurors are known over a long period of time, they become easy to approach with bribes.

True. Our system is lousy. But what’s the answer?

Many people serve ably on American juries who are so-called non-professionals. It is insulting to assert that a carpenter or dairy farmer is less able to determine guilt, innocence, punishment and compensation than a college professor or computer engineer.

There is a reason that the Constitution states “a jury of his peers” and not “a jury of really smart people who think they are better than others.”

I don’t even buy into Jim S’s view that a highly technical case might require a special jury. The system does not and should not work that way.

I was a defendant in a libel trial stemming from a medical malpractice case that the newspaper that I worked for had reported on. Much of the testimony was highly technical.

It was the job of the expert witnesses, with some help from lawyers, to make clear to the jurors what was in play. The jury foreman was the manager of a Burger King and many of the jurors were non-professions. They (pardon the term) acquitted themselves well.

So, I do have confidence in the jury system. Like everything else it is imperfect. What makes anyone think that perfect justice exists in this world? That a judge would be less biased than a jury? Judges hand down ridiculously lenient or harsh sentences every day, or make terrible decisions based on personal bias.

Me, I don’t think he willfully lied, but I wasn’t on the jury and didn’t hear all the evidence.

And that’s the crucial thing, going to your point about the average joe lacking the knowledge to make the bigger decisions. The jurors are asked to consider only the legally relevant, admissible evidence in making their decision. Over the course of the last several centuries, the rules of evidence have been developed to ensure that jurors do not make decisions based on irrelevant but emotionally powerful facts, but only facts that actually bean on whether or not the individual committed the crime. The juror is not supposed to be making political calls and political judgments, just factual ones.

In fact, it is the jurors, and only the jurors, who have ALL the knowledge necessary to resolve the case (assuming both sides’ attorneys do a proper job).

I don’t see what’s wrong with the jury’s decision. Should there not be consequences for impeding a Federal investigation? The man lied to cover for his bosses. If he wanted to tell the truth, then he could have and he wouldn’t be in this situation now.

The jury system isn’t the most bullet proof system. Every system has flaws indeed, just one system a bit more than the other.

The sad truth is that non-professionals are more likely to be influenced by rhetorical tricks.

I quite agree with Paul and Winnie that while the jury system has flaws, it works. And has worked extraordinarily well for over 200 years.

Yes, you will have the occasional Sob Sister juror who will have second thoughts, but there are checks and balances built into the system. These include a jury selection process where lawyers for both sides and the judge have ample room to select a representative jury and rules of procedure that give the judge ample grounds for dismissing a juror or, in extremely rare cases, an entire “rogue” jury.

To paraphrase Churchill, the jury system is the worst of all systems of justice…except for all of the others that have been tried.

And an actual quote from Churchill:

The power of the Executive to cast a man in prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgment of his peers is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government, whether Nazi or Communist.

Of course when you hear about dumb verdicts or dumb commentary from jurists, it’s natural to doubt the system, and again that’s similar to doubting democracy itself. On that, one last quote which may or may not be from WC:

The best argument against democracy is a five-minute talk with the average voter.

It is closer to guaranteeing the neutralization of political and personal retribution.

One can agree that someone did in fact break the law while also supporting leniency.