suppose you were on a jury...

What does the oath say you'll do?

 

Exactly how would you go about acquiring automatic firearms and set up trusts for those firearms as a convicted felon?

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Non-violent felons should have a way to regain all their rights.

Violent people should never be free to regain those rights.

 

Do you and each of you solemnly swear that you will well and truly try and a true deliverance make between the United States and ______, the defendant at the bar, and a true verdict render according to the evidence, so help you God?"

 

How would delivering a verdict one considers to be true a violation of this oath?

 

Kinda moving goal posts aren't you?
"could you vote to convict a violent offender who did what you thought was right?"
Which also morphed into laws we see as unjust.

 

Then it's clear that a statute which infringes on that right is illegal, right?

And your source for that claim is...?

That branch can pass laws which are unconstitutional, which is why we have a judicial branch which does most of its business in courtrooms.

And what oath would that be, exactly?

You understand that jury trials are not exclusively a federal process, right?

 

Actually, in every case of jury nullification that has happened, the jury has done just that. Just like the Supreme Court gave itself the power of judicial review in Marbury vs. Madison.

 

Sounds like you want to convict based on the fact that the person wants a race war, not upon the actual crime he would be charged with. I would not convict him, based on the law: the 2nd amendment which overrides all contradictory laws and case rulings saying that he has no right to bear arms.

 

Moving the goal posts? I don't think I've done that. My very first post in this thread was this:

As I initially stated, I would not convict someone of violating an unjust law.

 

I am not going to tell you how it is done since this is a public forum. But given that most states do not check names on trusts with their databases, a gun trust is simply a piece of paper showing that the trust, not the individual, owns the firearm. And since gun trusts generally does not require filing fees, fingerprints, and identification, it is quite easy to use fictitious names on that trust.

How do you define violent felons? Would a involuntary manslaughter charge where the person pleaded guilty, serves 15 to 25 years plus restitution is defined as a violent felon? Or how about a robbery where the person committing the crime alluded to the firearm but no firearm was present during the robbery, was found guilty in a court of law, serves 15 to 20 years in prison, and serves that sentence without incident is considered a violent crime? How about a person who is caught with 15 pounds of illicit drugs with the intent to distribute such drug, but the drug also causes violent reactions from the users that may cause death. Is that a violent crime?

I know the FBI definition of what they consider violent and non violent crimes. Negligent homicide is considered a violent crime, yet, there may be mitigating circumstances which the negligent homicide occurred.

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It was a fictitious example with a fictitious intent by the fictitious perputrator to prove a point on whether to convict based on one's conscience over one's belief in the law.

 

Yes, but you turned the entire premise on its head. Instead of refusing to convict for conscientious reasons (nullification of a law), you would instead be convicting for reasons of conscience, for something that is not a crime (i.e. making up a new law). When the question before you is "should I convict a person of the crime he is charged with", "yes" and "no" are valid answers. What is not valid is convicting someone of a non-crime that they are not charged with.

 

I wouldn't worry about the 'legality' aspects that much because I am not a lawyer nor am I expected to act as one as a juror. I would call it as I see it based on my own standards and the sum of my own parts and experience. I would say person B should have called the cops because that doesn't take much longer than to beat the owner up.

 

The problem with the example is that it was based on a certain action taken without taking into account the reason for the action taken. I simply added additional elements to the fictitious example to see whether or not jury nullification could be used.

A classic example would be would you convict someone for stealing food in order to feed the family? Let's say the amount is $500, a class 3 felony which could impose a fine not to exceed $10000 and/or imprisonment no less than 5 years and no more than 15 years. Even though the person committed the offense under the letter of the law, the underlying premise is not the law itself, but the circumstances in which the law was violated. And in this example, it is quite possible that jury nullification may be used assuming the jury believes that was the intent.

 

Your duty as a citizen would be to serve on that jury and nullify by voting innocent. The right of jury nullification is well established in history and in law. It is what prevents government from being tyranny.

 

This is absolutely right. The problem with this country is that no one takes their duty as a Citizen seriously. Being a Citizen is more of a duty than a right. It involves a certain amount of education in the law as well as the history of our country and a working knowledge of the Constitution.
Instead we have a country of morons who are incapable of making informed decisions either in a voting booth or in a jury deliberation. As a result we have a corrupt government and a corrupt criminal justice system where in both cases people just do as they are told and vote according to their personal prejudices.

 

To an extent, I would agree but for different reasons. Citizens who do not take their duty seriously are generally not the ones who serve as jury, but the ones who never reply to the jury summons or try to get paid more than the allotted amount by law.

Although jury nullification is well established, you have had arguments for jury nullification in the Timothy McVeigh case, George Zimmerman case, and several other high profile cases that had substantial political entanglements. Most common jury nullification cases today involve around felony drug cases on the state level.

And that is the problem with those who advocate jury nullification. The issue is whether or not is the use of jury nullification the law itself as unjust or that political ideology is being trumped over what is supposed to be blind justice.

 

Laws that are challenged for being unconstitutional aren't decided by jury trials, you know that right?

 

I think a lot of people confuse "blind justice" with blindly following the letter of the law. Two different things.

 

Do you think the jury blindly followed the letter of the law on the Timothy McVeigh case? Or how about Jury nullification on four LA police officer on a guy named Rodney King?

 

I don't know in either case. I'm not a big Court TV fan. I have better things to do. I do know that McVeigh was executed and at least some of those police officers served jail-time, so I don't know what point you're trying to make.

Are you disagreeing with my statement that blind justice and blindly following the letter of the law are separate things?

 

I am not sure what your experience is serving on juries, but I have served on several and mentality of many of the juror's is scary to say the least. I would estimate that about a third of the jury just wants to convict someone due to their own prejudice. I have served on juries where in deliberation the jurors were convinced of guilt simply because the person had been arrested or charged.
The average American has little or no real understanding of our criminal justice ( or injustice) system and less understanding of the reasons the system was designed the way it was.

The purpose of jury nullification is to allow the people to have final say in justice.

In many cases a person may have been guilty of breaking a law, but harmed no one in the process. A person may have in fact done the right thing in breaking a law, but if the laws and the robotic governmental justice system has its way, then the person would still be convicted of a crime. There is a difference between committing a crime, and breaking a law and anyone who does not know that difference should not be debating this topic.

Our current system of justice is a joke. No it is worse than that, it is criminal. The only hope for justice the American people have is the right of jury nullification. Without it we have nothing more than a tyrannical system of corrupt cops and DA's victimizing the public without restraint.

 

What if the law was based on the immoral Bible, and said it's ok to kill gays - I bet you'd have a hard time abiding by that law (as any moral person would, of course.)

 

They are in the cases of jury nullification. If you feel drug laws are unconstitutional, you have the right and the responsibility to vote for acquittal. While the Supreme Court can interpret the law, only the jury can decide if it is just. And that after all is what the Justice system is all about, not law, but Justice.

 

I would ignore the law and not kill.

 

Wrong question. Here's the right question: if judges can repudiate statutes on a constitutional basis, why can't juries do likewise?

Here's another right question: if a defendant is prosecuted under a statute which is in clear violation of a constitutional provision, how can a jury "well and truly try and a true deliverance make between the United States and ______, the defendant at the bar, and a true verdict render according to the evidence" without repudiating said statute? Hmmmm?