The right to trial by jury was designed as part of the “free heart and lungs” and was enshrined in the Constitution to protect people “from being ridden like horses, fleeced like sheep, worked like oxen, and treated like swine” Food and clothing and pigs,” according to John Adams.
In theory, it should still do this. But founders may be frustrated by the way the government has watered down that right since their death.
Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch today rebuked the use of a six-person jury instead of the historic 12-person jury.
his View hooked Cunningham v. Floridais the case of Natoya Cunningham, a Florida woman who was sentenced to eight years in prison after a six-person jury found her guilty of aggravated battery and retaliating against an informant to whom her nephew sold cocaine. Florida is one of six statesThe other states are Arizona, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts and Utah, which allow such criminal trials to be conducted by panels of six or eight people.
The court declined to hear Cunningham’s appeal. Yet Gorsuch noted in today’s dissent that it was the Supreme Court itself that gave the government the green light to shrink juries in its 1970 ruling Williams v. Florida, An arrangement of six was initially approved. Gorsuch said the “revolutionary” ruling was “an embarrassing mistake” that “deviates from the original meaning of the Constitution” and “centuries of historical practice.” The request of the 12 is indeed The standard for centuries Fifty-four years ago, the High Court underwent a U-turn.
“When it comes to academic research, williams Gorsuch wrote, “tepidly predicting that the six-member panel ‘could deliberate as carefully as a 12-member jury.'” But almost before the ink was dry on the court’s opinion, its opinion The social science research relied upon has come under scrutiny. Ballou v. Georgia, The court acknowledged that “recent empirical data suggest that shrinking jury sizes are unlikely to promote effective collective deliberation.”
With the advent of massive plea bargains, having a jury, small or otherwise, is simply out of the question for most people these days. Approximately 98% of federal convictions are achieved through plea agreements; the same is true for approximately 95% of convictions in state courts. Although plea bargains are widely seen in popular culture as giving defendants some breathing room, they’re also why some innocent people end up in prison for crimes they didn’t commit: Prosecutors often charge defendants with exorbitant charges and Severe sentences were imposed on them only to arouse their dissatisfaction. Some people roll the dice anyway. Many people don’t. Why exercise the Sixth Amendment correctly when it could cost you your life?
