How did this dude get on the jury with a biased mindset like that! Clearly conservatives have no problem with jurors voicing their biased opinions during deliberations. Rather they see it as one sticking to their “core (racist) values”!
I certainly hope SCOTUS will reverse the rule on jury secrecy, because if it isn’t, then it continues to perpetuate the injustices that we are fighting to change today! This crap has got to end!
It raises another possible avenue for appeal - ineffective assistance of counsel. The defense attorney should have been able to ferret this out during voir dire.
That still leaves one with the problem of “secrecy above impartiality,” however, and Justice Marshall’s example, in his dissent, was a good one. We toss out verdicts for various types of juror misbehavior - where do we draw the line? If a juror is bribed, does jury secrecy mean that we can’t do anything about it?
This isn’t really about juror misconduct. As the author wrote - “The rule, found in both federal and state law, is intended to promote the finality of verdicts and to shield jurors from outside influences.”
It’s about the death penalty and the legacy of Chief Justice Rehnquist.
Conservatives want the death penalty and complained about how long it took to kill off people on death row. THIS was one way to cut down appeals.
Need I say - Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama support the death penalty.
All you have to do to get on a jury is to appear plausible. Question: “Are you prejudiced against Mexicans?” Answer: “No.” OK, you’re good to go.
I support and am truly thankful of Justice Marshall’s example as well. How anyone can ignore or protect this bias due to “jury secrecy” is beyond me. Perhaps we should unveil the jury secrecy doctrine, especially when it its being used for the sole purpose to hide and protect biases.
I guess I’m not understanding why the Supreme Court even took up this case. It seems that the court that convicted this man should have found there was reason to call a mistrial and seat a different but impartial jury or at the very least get rid of the biased jurors and use the runner-ups. If this information came out after the guilty verdict or sentencing, are there no other remedies the lower court could take? And then why was this not reported when deliberations were being made to a court official?
And all you have to do to get out of being on a jury is show some semblance of intelligence.
Imagine now if a President Trump or Cruz nominee is appointed to the Supreme Court. Some people believe it would hasten the progressive revolution!
It’s an interesting conundrum. After all, we’re not entitled to a “perfect jury”, but a jury of our peers. And, unfortunately, these people are part of the American fabric.
We need a justice system that truly balances the weight of evidence impartially, but in a system with severe backlogs, how many more retrials can we afford? How do we determine if a juror’s bigoted beliefs actually impacted the outcome of the trial? After all, you can be an odious person, but also right on the facts of a case. In any case, it’s vital we get it right. Simply nothing worse than sending an innocent person to prison.
OK, but… follow it through to its logical conclusion. Say we permit a simple path for judgements to be overturned for jury misconduct. Then every time a defendant loses a trial, his lawyers will immediately start interviewing (probably compensating the interviewees - creating another cottage industry) until they find something - anything - that they can build an appeal argument around.
The trial system is not perfect and never will be. But our society would suffer if we ham-string it.
I think you have missed the entire point! The juror should have not made it on the jury in the first place. But he made it okay and I get that. The next level of second defense was to report the juror’s comment to the presiding judge over the jury. In fact that is the prosecutor’s job and yet they failed at providing proper oversight on the entire process. The third level of defense is now in the hands of the SCOTUS and if there is a detection of a juror overtly speaking his prejudices after rending judgment against an individual that matches that bias, then that is indeed an injustice to us all! And that my friend would include you too!
The court is highly unlikely to take the case. To do so would be reaching for an issue that is not seriously in dispute, nor one that would clearly change the verdict. The defendant was convicted–even the juror who reported the (alleged) biased comments thought that the guy was guilty. Taking the case is the kind of thing that the “conservative” justices have done, as they did with the immigration case that’s on their docket. The “liberal” wing of the court has not acted that way, and isn’t likely to in this case.
If we ended the war on drugs our courts would not be so crowded. Other countries don’t imprison so many people, so I imagine they must also have fewer trials.
If jurors know their every word is going to be dissected by really angry attorneys after each case, it’s hard to imagine that they’ll discuss cases the way they ought to. On the other hand, yep, if a juror says something really prejudicial you’re not going to get justice. (And we kinda know how jury-stacking has tended to go in the US over the decades.) I for one don’t have any clear answers (except maybe for some kind of utopian system where jurors feel more comfortable about calling a foul during proceedings.)
But I also don’t like the idea that you have to prove that the outcome would have been different if not for the bad behavior. A judge can always come up with rationalization about how a jury would have reached the same result even if the prejudicial conversations hadn’t taken place.
Wait, wait, wait. If the juror made the comment (or any comment other than “Good morning”, to the prosecutor, then the trial is borked beyond all recognition already and the Supreme Court doesn’t need to hear about it.
The next level of defense against misconduct (after voir dire) is one or more jurors “tattling” on the offender to the judge. If there is any meaningful connection between the jury and prosecution or defense, then it must be declared a mistrial. The only communications to the jury are controlled carefully by the judge, in the courtroom. Counsel has no access to the jury beyond the courtroom.
The third level of defense must not be SCOTUS because they don’t have time to hear all the cases to which this issue must apply. Their ruling will set a precedent that will affect how things subsequently are done in courts.
Well, it appears the case is going to be heard by the SCOTUS. To preserve of justice, the defendant must be entitled to a fair trial. The juror on the other hand, should be charged with perjuring himself. He misrepresented himself and in sheep’s clothing sat on the jury to decide the fate of a human being he internally despised! How disgusting is that!
Unless you have access to the court records, then you have been making up things. I certainly don’t know if the people in the juror pool were ever asked, “Would you be able to arrive at an impartial verdict if the defendant were Hispanic?”.
I tend to agree - while not perfect, it would be difficult to improve upon the current jury system. As you state, following thru to possible outcomes, I foresee situations where any single juror could scuttle any jury decision by making comments that she/he knows could nullify a verdict. Maybe not often, but it could happen with increased frequency, leading to the same cases being tried over and over again. Just imagine the cost!
And I agree that this particular juror should have either been spotted during voir dire or reported to the judge during the trial. If he/she made it all the way to deliberations and then exposed the biases, there would still have been time to seat an alternate, I think.
But, with all of that, I do feel bad for Pena Rodriguez’s circumstances.
Jury deliberations must be kept secret. Period. Full Stop. If this Pandora’s box is opened, two things will happen. 1) the next case will demand that juror deliberations must be recorded for review. 2) Sleazeball lawyers will harass jurors after cases that they did not win looking for something, anything, to get a re-trial. Sitting on a jury can suddenly be something that destroys your life.
Before you say that is going to far on the slippery slope argument, allow me to quote directly from the original appeal in 2012:
After the jury returned its verdict and was dismissed, two jurors told defense counsel that a juror – later identified as Juror 11 – had made racially biased statements during deliberations. Defendant moved for access to all of the jurors’ contact information.
Emphasis mine. Notice that the defense lawyers immediately asked for the contact information not for the juror’s in question, but all of them. This is how it would start. When you finish a case as a juror, you should be able to put it behind you and move on with your life. But now the defendant gets access to your contact information? You want to be on the jury convicting a violent gang member knowing your contact info goes to the defendant? I don’t. Being a juror on certain cases may follow you for the rest of your life.
The system isn’t perfect. I get that. But jury secrecy is vital to ensuring fair trials and to protecting the jury. And I don’t feel too bad for this guy. Looking at the case details (granted I am not a lawyer) about the underage victims he sexually assaulted, pretty hard to worry about him.