jury duty or "just following orders"

Jurors have a right to ignore the law and acquit a person. If a teacher doesn’t know that, it suggests serious incompetence of your school district in recruiting teachers. The law used to be different (jurors would be arrested for not convicting someone), but it was changed well before American independence. While judges and lawyers often want jurors who will follow the judges instructions, it is well known that they can ignore the judge as a matter of law. If a jury wrongfully convicts, the judge can ignore the jury and acquit, but not the other way around.

Some states (New York) have a ridiculous “voir dire” with heavy involvement by the lawyers, as opposed to others (Maryland) where the lawyers don’t get to ask any questions of prospective jurors. That could be changed easily by statute, but its up to each state.

When I was called for jury duty and was empaneled for a civil case I told the lawyers who were asking the questions to find a jury , “I would vote however it was necessary to finish the case as quickly as possible”. That got me dismissed from the case pretty quickly.

ubiquitin,

A recurring theme was would you follow orders even if you disagreed. For example they asked a lawyer in my group,” if you disagreed with a judge’s interpretation of the law would you put aside your own interpretation?” The lawyer said yes

In matters of Jewish law this can be a virtue, e.g., the exchange between Rabban Gamliel (the Nasi) and R’ Yehoshua over the proper date of Yom Kippur in the Mishna (2nd chapter of Rosh Hashana I think). For civil law, I don’t see how it’s a virtue.

One juror spoke up and said he is a school teacher and when children ask “why?” he says becasue those are the rules. The judge nodded approvingly and asked if anybody disagreed. I wanted to yell Of course I do, we arent children! We are freethinking individuals!

Why didn’t you say (or yell) that? Other people in your panel may have felt the same way you did, but perhaps nobody wanted to rock the boat. That’s part of how groupthink works.

Is groupthink like this a virtue?

No.

Do the lawyers no this isnt the wa normal grown ups work, and they are just looking for sheep whose minds they can meld? Or am I missing something?

A grownup may not work that way individually, but I think they do know that that’s how groups of people work, and so they utilize groupthink to help orchestrate the outcomes they desire. Why pose questions to a panel of potential jurors and challenge them to disagree with each other instead of interviewing each jury candidate separately?

akuperma: There’s several problems with what you espoused. First, dina d’malchusa does not override halacha, when halacha is different than secular law, when it pertains to matters between yehudim. Secondly, and even more important, Jews are generally prohibited from using secular courts and are obligated to rather use beis din. This prohibition is applicable even if both Jewish parties to the case agree to use secular court rather than beis din. And another Jew cannot be party to the process of other Jews violating this severe prohibition.

Also, how the “facts” are determined in a secular court differ with how the facts are ascertained in beis din. (i.e. admissible evidence, testimony, witnesses, etc.)

I think the assumption is that the judge will not have some ridiculous interpretation of the law, and that the law itself will be fair and reasonable.

Under those assumptions, even if a juror feels his interpretation is better or that he would have written the law differently, his job is to follow the judge’s interpretation, not his own, and the actual law, not his own preferred law.

Otherwise the whole jury system would be anarchistic.

First of all, ubiquitin, good job on the thread.

Briefly: MBP – My loyalty to Yiddishkeit supersedes my patriotism.

Excessive penalty – depends how excessive.

Marijuana – depends how strongly I felt about it.

Death penalty: ditto.

Joseph:

1. While frum Jews rarely sue each other in a non-Jewish court, it does happen when a third party is involved (e.g. the insurance company in a state with “fault” insurance, or in bankruptcy when a third party assumes a claim);

2. The American rules of evidence are very narrow, whereas in halacha the Beis Din can use any information at their disposal (we don’t have “exclusionary rules” as even when a type of evidence is not formally allowed the court can still consider it). On a jury, you are legally free to consider facts that are excluded – a good example is most jurors know that when a defendant “please the fifth” it is because he is guilty of something he doesn’t want the jury to know about, and all the “curative” instructions from the judge don’t help.

3. If frum Jews avoid serving on juries, you can count on people we don’t like taking our places. It similar to voting – you can argue against it, but the bottom line is that’s its in our interest to serve as jurors.

Both litigants did not agree to be adjudicated by them. Once the plaintiff files the lawsuit, the defendent hasn’t a choice but to respond to the secular court.

Joseph, I was referring to the jurors. Both litigants agreed on the jurors. The defendant could have requested a non-jury trial. He could also have requested ADR. In some jurisdictions the judge can direct the parties to a court or court-approved provider.

Akuperma, then why are the Satmar brothers in Civil court?

I don’t understand your question; he said it’s rare, not impossible.

Also, one of them is there because he was sued and has no choice.

DY, it’s a cynical Kal v’chomer. If it’s not Assur for them to go to civil court ……..

akuperma………..

“1. While frum Jews rarely sue each other in a non-Jewish court, it does happen when a third party is involved (e.g. the insurance company in a state with “fault” insurance, or in bankruptcy when a third party assumes a claim);”

Actually, I have found in my years of practice that when there are frum Jews on both the Plaintiff and Defendant sides of the courtroom, it is NOT one frum Jew suing another Frum Jew, but one or both parties in the lawsuit are actually corporations. The frum Jews tend to either be principals in the corporations or agents for the corporation.

While individual Jews suing another Jew are supposed to make use of the Beis din, corporations are not necessarily bound to do so.

In divorce work, I recommend a beis din when both husband and wife are Jewish, and then have the secular court ratify the decision/agreement of the BD. I feel no obligation to force use of a BD when a Jew is suing a corporation that may be owned (in part or full) by a Jew(s).

ubiquitin,

Though I grant there are limited instances where your point is true.

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I think the “limited instances” are where the point is not true.

I was on the fence It was partly becasue they were all so emphatic and the Judge was nodding so approvingly that I was concerned disagreeing without having ample time to explain myself, might be a chilul Hashem. And It wasnt really my platform to take the time I needed. I had already made my opinion known by that time after all.

But maybe I should have

That is how groupthink works.

Avi, I specifically specified an all-Jewishly owned corporation and specifically excluded a partially Jewish owned corporation. Your comment is pertinent to a mixed Jewish/Gentile owned corporation. An all Jewishly owned corporation is surely prohibited from the activities you cited.

Joseph, regarding closely held corporations you are almost certainly right. It does seem anomalous to allow Jews to exempt themselves from prohibitions just by declaring themselves a corporation. However, if it is a public corporation whose present shareholders are all Jewish but might not be in the near future it gets sticky. What about a huge corporation whose CEO is Jewish (as was DuPont when Irving S. Shapiro headed it)? It would seem that he is no different than any Jew who works for a gentile.

Gavra, Hobby Lobby is a closely held corporation and this was he basis of SCOTUS’ decision.

A better one would have a panel of judges, learned in law, judge the case, rather than a panel of laymen unlearned, potentially homeless or alcoholics jurors being paid $40/day wanting nothing more than to be done with it the sooner the better. And if a quick guilty verdict helps them not miss their favorite TV sitcom or finally get back to their $9/hour construction job instead of this involuntary $5/hour court service, render the verdict ASAP is what they’ll do, justice be darned.

Re Ubiquitin’s comment beginning “nfgo/I served in New York ….” Your proposal to do some screening of jurors on line is interesting, and maybe it will be tried in the future.

Re Joseph’s comment beginning “A better world ….” Your proposal assumes that permanent panels of judges have more integrity than non-permanent panels of non-judge civilians. Yes, there are a few drunks and jerks among the general population, but overall, I think civilian jurors/fact-finders work better than politically appointed “judges” who, incidentally, have their own shares of drunks and jerks, not to mention crooks. Watch the sentencing of Skelos, for example.

Defense attorneys don’t want people who can think for themselves. The last time I was on Jury Duty, 10 of us were called up to the Judge. One clueless woman was the only one chosen for the Jury. The Defense Attorney knocked out everyone else.

He asked me, ” Do you have a problem with people running around in the streets with guns?” I answered, “I have a problem with criminals running around the streets with guns, don’t you?” Seems like a reasonable answer to me, but he knocked me out. At least it was only one wasted day, not three.

edited

Ubiquitin, why didn’t the other lawyer object to the instruction and if overruled use it as a ground for appeal?

Barry, maybe he felt that you were personally hostile to him. If not, he may have wasted one of his peremptory challenges. BTW, a lawyer may not use them to exclude a jurors based on race, ethnicity, or sex (Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986)). Thus, the opposing lawyer can issue a “Batson challenge” to the jury. If this goes the way of general anti-discrimination laws expect this to develop into a whole megilla.