California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries • Hacker News Board

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#71

Post by kevingadd » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 12:48 PM UTC

RaceWon wrote: post #60

colejohnson66 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

False equivalence. No, but I’d let someone convicted of a robbery 20 years ago and nothing since serve me at a fast food restaurant since they’ve served their debt to society.

> False equivalence. No, but I’d let someone convicted of a robbery 20 years ago and nothing since serve me at a fast food This appears as a perfect false equivalence imo. Would you also let someone who was convicted of poisoning people serve you fast food? Here's some [0] stats about repeat offeders [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recidivism

Are you claiming most poisoners act randomly and would continue to do so after release? What's your basis for that? Poison is often used as a method for specific assassination/murder, and murder is sometimes committed in scenarios of domestic violence or taking out personal grudges. Why would people from those scenarios then go on to poison fast food customers?

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#72

Post by kevingadd » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 12:50 PM UTC

EliRivers wrote: post #64

3fe9a03ccd14ca5 wrote: post #3

I’m normally automatically skeptical of anything passed by our legislature here (which passes laws to ban plastic straws and water in restaurants but couldn’t care less about feces and mental illness all over the streets). For this, I’m totally 100% behind the decision. A jury of our peers is as good as it gets, folks. Even with the drawbacks it will never get better. We need to protect it and honor it, and that incl…

A jury of our peers is as good as it gets, folks. Is it? How about professional jurors. Would that be an improvement? Or a mix of the two; some peers, some professionals. Or what about short-engagement professional jurors - selected from the citizenry at large, but then given some proper training and acting as jurors for a year. Or perhaps a cadre of professionally trained jurors who take a few months to become train…

What specifically makes "professional jurors" better, though? I won't say the idea isn't appealing, but what about making them professionals makes them better than our peers? There are already a bunch of heavily regulated professionals involved in the process so it's kind of arbitrary to claim that we need to regulate more of it.

Why not limit witness testimony to professionals too?

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#73

Post by kevingadd » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 12:52 PM UTC

tombrossman wrote: post #50

ISL wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the wrong question -- if a juror is that certain, pre-trial, that a defendant is guilty, there is no way that the defendant can get a fair trial.

> if a juror is that certain, pre-trial, that a defendant is guilty, there is no way that the defendant can get a fair trial Sure they can, one nutjob juror cannot convict. I've also been seated on juries where some of my fellow jurors were quite obviously biased against the defendant, and this really hurt their credibility with me. I wasn't the only one either, other jurors challenged some of the statements they mad…

One nutjob juror cannot convict, but one person can prevent a unanimous verdict by refusing to cooperate or objectively evaluate testimony and follow the rules. The result of that in many cases is a hung jury and then a mistrial.

Combine this with the concept of jury nullification (something law enforcement DESPISES) and there are lots of situations where it would make sense for a juror to refuse to align with the rest of the jury.

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#74

Post by harimau777 » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 12:58 PM UTC

3fe9a03ccd14ca5 wrote: post #3

I’m normally automatically skeptical of anything passed by our legislature here (which passes laws to ban plastic straws and water in restaurants but couldn’t care less about feces and mental illness all over the streets). For this, I’m totally 100% behind the decision. A jury of our peers is as good as it gets, folks. Even with the drawbacks it will never get better. We need to protect it and honor it, and that incl…

Putting aside the specific issue of felons serving on juries.

A hypothetical issue with the concept of "a jury of our peers" could be defining "peers".

Are there situations where the issue being litigated is sufficiently specialized that the average person would not constitute a peer? For example, determining whether an engineer followed proper practices.

At least in America, is so little shared world view between different segments of society (Democrat and Republican, rural and urban, upper class and working poor, west coast and deep south, etc.) that a given pair of citizens might effectively not be peers?

These concerns could be especially important since the law often depends on determining what a "reasonable person" would do in a situation which might vary depending on the "reasonable person's" background.

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#75

Post by RaceWon » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 12:59 PM UTC

colejohnson66 wrote: post #61

RaceWon wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> False equivalence. No, but I’d let someone convicted of a robbery 20 years ago and nothing since serve me at a fast food This appears as a perfect false equivalence imo. Would you also let someone who was convicted of poisoning people serve you fast food? Here's some [0] stats about repeat offeders [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recidivism

No I wouldn’t, but some would. I should’ve mentioned that where they’re allowed to work should be dependent on what their crime was. A robber can’t work at a bank, etc.

> No I wouldn’t, but some would. I should’ve mentioned that where they’re allowed to work should be dependent on what their crime was. A robber can’t work at a bank, etc.

However; a robber can serve as a jurist? I don't understand your logic; if it was you who were on trial, wouldn't you hope that the jury of your peers had a higher degree of ethics than a gal who robbed a bank? I know I would.

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#76

Post by HorstG » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 1:11 PM UTC

rootsudo wrote: post #63

pell wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The jury system seems completely corrupt to me. I am glad we do not use this method in criminal trials here in Germany where I live.

Corrupt? It's a jury of your peers, how is it corrupt? It's random people that decide your fate. In German it's judges. So a judge tries you and says you're guilty or innocent? You have to forego your right of trial by Jury in the USA for that to be the case.

In Germany there is the Schoeffengericht aka jury trial for intermediate crime. Schoeffen are also called Laienrichter, layman judges, there just aren't that many of them and procedures are different.

The decision of facts (as opposed to legal decisions) is a majority vote of professional and layman judges...

edit: major —> intermediate

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#77

Post by EliRivers » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 1:17 PM UTC

kevingadd wrote: post #72

EliRivers wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A jury of our peers is as good as it gets, folks. Is it? How about professional jurors. Would that be an improvement? Or a mix of the two; some peers, some professionals. Or what about short-engagement professional jurors - selected from the citizenry at large, but then given some proper training and acting as jurors for a year. Or perhaps a cadre of professionally trained jurors who take a few months to become train…

What specifically makes "professional jurors" better, though? I won't say the idea isn't appealing, but what about making them professionals makes them better than our peers? There are already a bunch of heavily regulated professionals involved in the process so it's kind of arbitrary to claim that we need to regulate more of it. Why not limit witness testimony to professionals too?

There are many ways for juries to just get things wrong, to misunderstand their role, to misunderstand the law, and so on. Sometimes these errors get recognised and corrected, at a cost; sometimes they just plain don't. Some jurors simply don't know how to pay attention and keep track for extended periods of time. Some education and training in advance could create massively more competent juries.

Why not limit witness testimony to professionals too?

Because we don't have a time machine to place professional witnesses where they need to be in order to witness things to testify about.

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#78

Post by fenomas » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 1:20 PM UTC

thenewewb wrote: post #40

harikb wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a good chance she used an explicit statement like that to get herself dismissed from the jury pool.

Also a good chance OP is lying on the Internet.

Assume good faith please.

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#79

Post by kevingadd » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 1:22 PM UTC

EliRivers wrote: post #77

kevingadd wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What specifically makes "professional jurors" better, though? I won't say the idea isn't appealing, but what about making them professionals makes them better than our peers? There are already a bunch of heavily regulated professionals involved in the process so it's kind of arbitrary to claim that we need to regulate more of it. Why not limit witness testimony to professionals too?

There are many ways for juries to just get things wrong, to misunderstand their role, to misunderstand the law, and so on. Sometimes these errors get recognised and corrected, at a cost; sometimes they just plain don't. Some jurors simply don't know how to pay attention and keep track for extended periods of time. Some education and training in advance could create massively more competent juries. Why not limit witne…

Sure, but we already know false/confused testimony is a massive problem, so is it necessarily the case that limiting it to professionals would be worse? Professionals analyzing the evidence, video tapes, etc. We're already moving towards universal surveillance. Many states ban one-party phone/in-person chat recordings, but if we allowed one-party recordings anywhere, any dispute over conversations could be resolved with personal recordings.

Just a thought exercise.

Re: California is about to allow former felons to serve on juries

#80

Post by vishnu_ks » Sun, Dec 08, 2019, 1:23 PM UTC

I recently listened to a podcast in which James Beshar interviews an anonymous San Francisco police officer who has been in the service for a long time. The police officer said that there are a lot of loopholes(not talking about paroles, probation or anything related) in California justice system in particular that allows felons to come out much faster than the actual time sentenced. For example felons that are sentenced for 30+ years in prison for committing serious crimes can come out in as fast as in 15 years by staying in certain prisons/jails that counts the time served as 2x or 3x. So lawyers game this so that the felons stay in these prisons/jails longer than other prisons and come out faster. I personally has not thought much about any of these issues and neither have a stand or expertise on what is right or wrong. I found what the police officer said (so did the host) very interesting and thought its worth sharing here.

https://anchor.fm/belowtheline/episodes/37--Anonymous--San-F...

Updated the comment for clarification.