Nullification Jury Nullification When One Article Critique

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Today we do not have the reassurance that injustice as a result of jury nullifications are behind us. Racism is still a prevalent issue in our society and it is concentrated at times within communities, making it possible to have a majority within the jury carrying prejudices into the courtroom. Shamefully our courts have had to let rapists walk because "Juries have acquitted … after concluding that the victims deserved to be raped because of the way they dressed or acted" (King, 1999, p. 4). It is evident that "jurors are not in any better position than judges or prosecutors to decide which defendants should be exempted from a law's reach" (King, 1999, p. 5).

Because juries are comprised of people who may or may not be familiar with the details of the law - and are largely not lawmakers themselves - we run the risk of nullifications being haphazardly granted based on appeals to emotion, rather than through the lens of objective justice-seeking. While proponents claim that "nullification is needed for "fine-tuning" of the law," jurors are hardly qualified to handle this. The judgment of juries about the validity and necessity of a particular law is askew because they may not know the history or be cognizant of the consequences of allowing someone to walk who is clearly guilty of breaking that law. King (1999) says, "when facts are not in issue and guilt is clear, the ability of jurors to reach sound decisions about when the law should be suspended and when it should be applied is questionable at best" (p. 5).

Even with these dangers, proponents lead us to believe that jury nullification is some kind of right that juries have under the Constitution.

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Several problems exist with this fallacy because in truth, " the Constitution does not support an enhanced lawmaking role for juries." Jurors swear in and are under oath while serving our courts and "have no personal constitutional right to disregard the law" (King, 1999, p. 6). The "Constitution does not protect jury nullification itself. It protects a defendant's right to fact-finding by a jury and to the finality of a verdict" (King, 1999, p. 6).

The risks of allowing jury nullifications to continue as unregulated jaunts of careless judging on the part of individuals who may or may not understand the ramifications of their actions, or the details of the law, let alone the ideals under which the trial by jury process was established are dangerous at best. If jury nullification cannot realistically be stopped, it needs to be regulated. Until this process is regulated we are rolling the dice with each and every criminal trial. Rather than respecting the law and the history that has guided our democracy into the just system we have now we are turning the courtroom into a casino and spinning the roulette wheel on justice......

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