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| Authored by: PJ on Friday, February 22 2013 @ 08:22 AM EST |
The law was clear. It was deciding
whether the accused was guilty that was
the problem. I read it like this:
there were admissions, but the jury
felt that the wife was pressured, even
though they couldn't prove it, and
despite the judge's annoyance, I think
they did the right thing to refuse to
convict someone they felt had a defense
that their lawyer hadn't raised but
that they felt was the real reason she
did what she did.
Others on the jury pointed out that
nobody had proven it. But the ones who
felt empathy for the accused felt that
it would be unjust to punish severely
someone who had been pressured by
someone else, who they viewed as the
real guilty party. So they just wouldn't
budge.
That is what you should do, frankly, if
in doubt. At that point, the ones
for conviction should have asked themselves
if, since not everyone could agree to
convict, they could acknowledge that
the prosecution had failed to convince
them all, and so they should just let
the defendant off.
But judicial annoyance doesn't necessarily
mean the judge is right. The fact that
the jury couldn't phrase their questions
in a way that sounded better doesn't mean
they were not sincerely bothered by the
thought of convicting someone they felt
wasn't really guilty as charged. They
maybe couldn't put their finger on it,
but they felt it.
That's precisely what juries are for.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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