The Glade 4.0

Bob comes home and finds his wife has been raped and the perpetrator fled the scene. The cops refuse to investigate. Bob finds out who did it, because it was someone Mrs. Bob knew. Bob shoots Mr. Rapist. Bob gives the cops a legal and willing confession.

Should Bob go to the jail?

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Who is this question directed to?

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You, Hypnotoad. Do try to keep up

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Yes Bob should go to jail.

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Hopwin:

Jury Nullification in that situation means the jury can find him guilty but vacate the charges and sentence because they disagree that he should serve time ... in that particular case. It does not change law; it does not mean the law for murder goes away. It means the jury can nullify the legal application of statute in the case on which they rule.

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Which is completely different than the most recent decision by the USSC that juveniles cannot be sentenced to life in prison without parole except in the case of murder.

I don't know what collusion you're talking about.

In any case, on most political issues there are at least 2 different opinions and goals as well.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

That does not seem to square with the way it has been represented in the past.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Just to clarify on this point, the jury doesn't return an actual verdict of guilty and then vacate the charge/sentence. It returns a verdict of innocent, despite believing that the defendant violated the law, and thereby prevents the defendant from being convicted and punished. It's a de facto power to "nullify" the law by simply refusing to apply it.

Here, its not atypical, especially at the state level, for judges to be elected in a kind of bartering system, where you gain another politician's support for your "candidate" by making swaps of votes later, or in other races, and I suspect, based upon chatting with others, this is typical in states where judges are elected by the legislature and not via general elections.

Even the "vetting" process to narrow down the list of candidates is highly political and less about being a judge.

Its very unlikely you will see two attorneys work together to divy up the "wins" on their common cases like that.

But only for that specific case. The law is not stricken from the books.

You were correct, I was utterly ignorant of it. Can the nullification be appealed?

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Hopwin:

Negative. It's protected by double jeopardy laws. Hence, despite being legal, valid, and constitutionally protected by Due Process, it's pretty much taboo to mention jury nullification.

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Not in a criminal trial, as that would violate the Constitutional prohibition on double jeopardy. Once a jury acquits you, you're free to go. However, it's not entirely clear (splits in the Circuits) as to whether or not a judge can order a mistrial or remove a juror prior to a verdict if it becomes clear that the defense attorney is arguing for jury nullification or one or more members of the jury intend to nullify.

*Edit: Khross beat me to it.

Fascinating. So why would you need special provisions for jury nullification when the jury could simply return a not-guilty verdict?

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Because the person is clearly guilty. However, the crime which they committed is seen as justified, or excusable to their peers. Sometimes these "nullifications" get enshrined in actually law to preserve a sense of uniformity between cases, such as battered wife laws, etc.

Actually I know of an instance personally of attorneys dividing up wins, in cases of exceedingly pedestrian nature.

As to the judges in that area, judges here are elected, so we experience no such problem.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Jury nullification has become less common and less supported by the legal system. Attorneys generally aren't allowed to argue for it, judges generally don't make juries aware of the possibility, and like I said, judges may be able to declare mistrials and remove jurors if they see a nullification coming. It's basically frowned upon by the legal "elite" and it's dying out as a result. I suspect the Ohio proposal is intended to counteract that by permitting lawyers and judges to openly advise the jury of the nullification option and by preventing judges from declaring mistrials and removing jurors.

It's important to note that there are good arguments both for and against jury nullification. There's no question that it was commonly understood to be part of the legal landscape when the Constitution was written, but the justice of it's actual practice in US history has been mixed. Think about the racial tensions in this country, and you'll have a pretty good idea what I mean!

OOoh, we'll just prejudice opinion by mentioning racial tensions. Yay!

Come one, you need a beating for that one, RD.

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Elected by whom? General election of the citizens, or by your legislature? If by the legislature, you are mostly likely incorrect, you just don't see it being outside the election process.

As for the example you gave... that's disbarment for those attorneys... for politicians, its called bi-partisanship.

*chuckle* Fair point, Khross. The racial tensions thing can go both ways, though. I mean, jury nullification was pretty popular among abolitionists to prevent enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Laws in the north, which would be considered a just outcome today. On the other hand, jury nullification was also pretty popular among racists to prevent convictions of white people who attacked and/or killed black people during the Jim Crow era, which would obviously be considered an unjust outcome today. And hey, in the modern context...OJ!

Honestly, though, I didn't mean to bias opinions. I'm not even sure which side of the fence I come down on.

By the citizens. Even if it weren't, I wouldn't be "most likely incorrect" in the absence of evidence.



That's because A) politicians are not attorneys (even if they are, they aren't acting as such) and B) it evidently was not disbarment.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Local jury nullification activists are pretty active in my area. Recently in Allentown one was arrested for simply distributing "informed jury" materials in regards ot nullification.

http://c4ss.org/content/2466

He was charged with assault but video of the incident shows the marshall was actually the one comitting assault.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

You've staunchly entered into your I'm going to argue every nuance to win mode, so this will be it for me. Feel free to stretch as much as you wish.

That said, then clearly they weren't reported to the BAR, or whatever "evidence" that was presented to the BAR review was insufficient or non-existant to render a decision, so you don't actually "know" anything about what they were doing, or its purely anecdotal. In any event, regardless of the specifics of this anecdotal example of yours, that kind of activity by attorneys is grounds for not only disbarment, but civil and criminal penalties. Yay for you if you can pull some obscure "friend of a friend" example out of your ***, but it doesn't invalidate the point.

/commence your unread response now.

Wow, going right into the snarky hostility aren't we? The fact of the matter is that politicians are not doing the same job as attorneys are. Calling that "nuance" is horseshit.



Actually I know exactly what they were doing because they discussed it quite casually. Maybe you ought not to pretend you actually know what was going on when you weren't there.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."