I did it once. A murder trial, the accused was from the wrong side of the tracks. At the end of the trial, we entered the jury room and immediately had a vote, 11 guilty and me on my tod voting not guilty. No one wanted to discuss the evidence but I finally managed to get them to agree to discuss it, after doing this for a while, I had the feeling that I made no headway. I agreed that the other 11 should hold a secret ballot and if they all found him guilty, I would acquiesce. Amazingly someone agreed with me. Little by little, we examined the evidence and gradually the other jurors came to agree with my line of thinking, christ there were some angry people in that room, but in the end we got a 12 - 0 not guilty verdict and hopefully an innocent lad got to enjoy the rest his life.
Wow.
You couldn't make it up.
there's got to be a film in that somewhere, mefty
A very good one I should imagine.
EDIT: Might be worth putting on the stage first though.
I was on a jury, probably going on for 10 years ago now. Was a month long trial for attempted murder of a policeman, two accused.
Found guilty, about 30 years each.
Rewarding, fascinating, and depressing, all at the same time really. By far the worst part for me was witnessing the apathy and prejudice by most in the jury room.
Quote from [url= http://www.theguardian.com/law/shortcuts/2013/feb/21/10-things-jurors-need-to-know ]this article[/url] sums it up; "You will witness the best and worst sides of humanity in that room. It will both exhaust and invigorate you."
Judge awarded us a waiver for ten years, so I guess I'm just about eligible again!
I don't remember the waiting around as others describe, was pretty efficient, but lot's of going in and out of the court. But hours sat in court can be hard work.
I was the only juror not to swear in using the Christian oath, (there is a non-religious alternative). Not that it is relevant at all, but it was a very important thing to me at the time.
I did it, and went in to it thinking it'd be 'a laugh'.
Mmm...when the first prosecution witness is the son of the defendant, who then goes on to state that his old man ****ed him up the @rse as a five year...oh boy, grim. Two other charges of being a sexual predator against teenager boys.
Five or six day case.
Yes, an inefficient system.
The cross section of folk on the jury (15, in Scotland) was interesting.
Unfortunately, by the first mid-morning break lots of people had categorically decided the defendant was guilty on very first impressions and were unwilling to listen to anything further and just wanted out of there.
One guy on the jury didn't want to deliberate the charges for more than ten minutes 'as I've had a good tip on the 2.30 at Doncaster and I need to get out of here'.
I ended up as jury spokesperson, largely as I felt the only one confident enough to lead a detailed discussion on some of the points the judge had asked us to consider...and as the guy was going to go down for a decent stretch, I thought we should take it seriously.
Quite an experience stating the verdict - two unanimous and one majority and looking the judge and defendant in the eye at the time. I never did find out how long he went down for, or whether there were other cases against him.
Speaking to a mate after who is a barrister, quite revealing / bizarre that my feedback was the first time he'd really heard feedback from a juror (he wasn't on my case) about the jury experience.
Defending barrister / QC was formidable and charismatic, prosecution dude a totally bumbling unconfident chump.
A great, but at times grim, experience.
Would love to do it again.
As my mate the barrister / QC stated, there was a predictable adjournment at about midday Friday, as all the legal folk were off for lunch / golf / long weekend...
As someone who brings cases to court AND I've been a juror as well I can say that you don't see the other side of the action as a juror and there's a lot of things that happen around cases that are vital and do delay things but can seem frustrating.
Every experience of court rooms I've had now makes me glad to be in this country and have our legal/judicial system. No it's not 100% perfect every time but it really is as good as it's likely to get (maybe could be a bit more efficient but I mean how they use the law).
People who think judges are bumbling fools like you see portrayed in TV sometimes need to go and see a court case, the judges really are quite amazing at how they bring the hearing together and are very good with juries too.
With regards to the deliberation thing, we went through all the key evidence and arguments and discussed in detail how relevant we thought it was. Two and a half days it took but we came to a unanimous not guilty charge. Everyone took it as seriously as you'd hope. There is still some hope for society and justice.