Serving As A Juryman In Britain
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1965.tb02906.x |
| Published date | 01 September 1965 |
| Author | Ely Devons |
| Date | 01 September 1965 |
SERVING AS A JURYMAN IN BRITAIN
IT
is with considerable diffidence and hesitation that
I
give a public
lecture on a legal subject.'
For
I
have no professional qualification
in the study of law, either British
or
American, and
I
fear that
I
will say many things which will merely reveal my ignorance. But
I
am emboldened to take the risk because my subject
"
Serving as
a
Juryman
"
is not one of which professional lawyers have any
experience.
For
in England, and
I
believe in the United States as
well, lawyers are understandably precluded from serving on juries.
Although a great deal has been written, mostly by lawyers, about
the role of the jury in the legal system, none of it, in England at
least, is based on information about what goes on in the jury room.
Let me make it clear at the outset that what
I
have to say is
based entirely on two periods
of
jury service which
I
was called for
in Manchester a few years ago; the first period for the quarter
sessions and the second
for
the assizes, each period for about a week.
On
each of these two occasions,
I
served myself on juries for two
cases, neither of which lasted more than a single day. The rest of
the time
I
spent sitting around in court, listening to other cases,
waiting to be called.
But
in
some
of
these cases, which
I
merely
listened to,
I
had nonetheless an opportunity of discussing, perhaps
unlawfully, with the jurymen concerned after the case was over,
what had gone
on
in the jury
room
and what had influenced the
jury in arriving at its conclusion.
It
is this question which is the central theme of my lecture-
what evidence influences
a
jury in its findings. But
I
must repeat,
at the risk of boring you, that in answering this question
I
am
merely giving a view of my personal experience which is confined
to
a
small number of cases, and for all
I
know may be quite
unrepresentative.
First of all let me give a little background information as to
how a jury is selected. This is of some importance, because as
I
hope to show later, the class composition of a jury and their social
experience and knowledge may have considerable importance in
influencing their assessment of some
of
the evidence placed before
them. In England each local government authority has to keep
up
to
date
a
list of registered voters, and this list (often used by market
researchers) specifies with a letter
J
which of the electors is eligible
for
jury service. There is
a
general property qualification; at the
time when
I
was called owners of property with more than a value
of
S10
a year freehold
or
S20
a year leasehold, and householders
1
This paper wa8 originally given as
one
of
the John Hinkley Memorial Lectures
561
at
the
Johns
Hopkins University
in
the
Autumn
of
1964.
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