Jury Nullification
Everyone in the United States of America has at least two criminal courts in the jurisdiction in which they live. This includes a state court (often called a county court or a circuit court) and a federal court. These courts impose criminal sentences in the name of the people. We want the courts to have a significant degree of autonomy, to follow principles of law without regard to current public opinion or political influence. We also want the courts to be fair.
But we do not want the courts to completely ignore the will of the people, especially when they do so with no adequate grounding in law, and in strikingly unjust ways. This has, unfortunately, occurred too often in criminal sentencing practices of the past 40 years.
So, Justice Not Prisons proposes that we appeal to another significant part of our political and cultural heritage: the right of the people to have some say about what constitutes justice in our courts.
Jury nullification represents the most dramatic instance of the people having their say about justice and intervening in decisions at court. In short, jury nullification means that juries can sometimes decide that the law is unjust and hence refuse to convict the defendant, despite the evidence presented. Examples of jury nullification can be found in legendary cases such William Penn, charged in London, England in 1670 with the crime of praying in public, and John Peter Zenger, charged in 1734 with publishing a newspaper article criticizing the royal governor of New York. In both cases, courageous juries refused to convict - despite overwhelming evidence against the defendants - because they found the law in question unjust. The Penn jury was itself punished with incarceration for refusing to return the desired verdict of the state.
Jury nullification is controversial and still contested. Jury nullification can be used to prevent injustice, as well as to perpetuate it. Notorious and tragic instances occurred frequently in cases in which white defendants were charged with crimes against blacks - often crimes of serious violence - especially under Jim Crow conditions in the South in the late 19th century and well into the 20th century. Here, jury nullification served to reinforce oppression and injustice. It ignored the principle of equal protection of the law, and instead used the law to further abuse the victimized.
Nevertheless, jury nullification as a means of preventing injustice has reemerged in contemporary conversations around the problem of mass incarceration. For example, Paul Butler, a former Federal prosecutor and associate dean at George Washington University Law School, has argued forcefully since 1995 for a different type of racially-based jury nullification. Racially-based jury nullification would entail African American juries acquitting African American defendants charged with non-violent crimes that lack victims, such as drug offenses.
Why? Butler reasons that the war on drugs has escalated law enforcement dragnet practices, ill-advised prosecutions, and unjust sentences. In doing so, it has devastated many African American communities. Butler observed this occurring when he was a prosecutor in Washington, D.C. in the early 1990s. Eventually, he spoke out about it, early on in an appearance on "60 Minutes" and recently in his book, Let’s Get Free: A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice (2009).
Jury nullification provides a kind of precedent for the court watch advocacy work that Justice Not Prisons seeks to inspire and grow. However, we would focus on a later stage of criminal prosecution, that of sentencing: Court Watch Advocacy 101.
But we do not want the courts to completely ignore the will of the people, especially when they do so with no adequate grounding in law, and in strikingly unjust ways. This has, unfortunately, occurred too often in criminal sentencing practices of the past 40 years.
So, Justice Not Prisons proposes that we appeal to another significant part of our political and cultural heritage: the right of the people to have some say about what constitutes justice in our courts.
Jury nullification represents the most dramatic instance of the people having their say about justice and intervening in decisions at court. In short, jury nullification means that juries can sometimes decide that the law is unjust and hence refuse to convict the defendant, despite the evidence presented. Examples of jury nullification can be found in legendary cases such William Penn, charged in London, England in 1670 with the crime of praying in public, and John Peter Zenger, charged in 1734 with publishing a newspaper article criticizing the royal governor of New York. In both cases, courageous juries refused to convict - despite overwhelming evidence against the defendants - because they found the law in question unjust. The Penn jury was itself punished with incarceration for refusing to return the desired verdict of the state.
Jury nullification is controversial and still contested. Jury nullification can be used to prevent injustice, as well as to perpetuate it. Notorious and tragic instances occurred frequently in cases in which white defendants were charged with crimes against blacks - often crimes of serious violence - especially under Jim Crow conditions in the South in the late 19th century and well into the 20th century. Here, jury nullification served to reinforce oppression and injustice. It ignored the principle of equal protection of the law, and instead used the law to further abuse the victimized.
Nevertheless, jury nullification as a means of preventing injustice has reemerged in contemporary conversations around the problem of mass incarceration. For example, Paul Butler, a former Federal prosecutor and associate dean at George Washington University Law School, has argued forcefully since 1995 for a different type of racially-based jury nullification. Racially-based jury nullification would entail African American juries acquitting African American defendants charged with non-violent crimes that lack victims, such as drug offenses.
Why? Butler reasons that the war on drugs has escalated law enforcement dragnet practices, ill-advised prosecutions, and unjust sentences. In doing so, it has devastated many African American communities. Butler observed this occurring when he was a prosecutor in Washington, D.C. in the early 1990s. Eventually, he spoke out about it, early on in an appearance on "60 Minutes" and recently in his book, Let’s Get Free: A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice (2009).
Jury nullification provides a kind of precedent for the court watch advocacy work that Justice Not Prisons seeks to inspire and grow. However, we would focus on a later stage of criminal prosecution, that of sentencing: Court Watch Advocacy 101.