I Submitted a "Not Guilty" Verdict Today

on jury duty in Prince Georges County, Maryland.

The defendant was a 16-year-old ghetto kid who was riding in the back of an SUV with his friend and older brother when the car was stopped and a sawed-off shotgun was found on the rear floor wrapped in a blanket.

Along with the other two passengers (separate cases), he was charged with "handling, carrying, or transporting" a firearm illegally.

The jury deliberated for about half an hour, but we could not convict even though all we had to do was show was that the defendant knew about the gun.

I was a little shocked by how sloppy and ambiguous the trial was. There were a number of conflicting or unsubstantiated claims over where the gun was, when it was discovered, what the police knew when they pulled the car over, which passenger told the police there was a gun in the car, etc. Some seemingly irrelevant points were discussed ad nauseum, while seemingly critical questions as to who tipped off the police, when they did it, and whether the gun had any fingerprints, were glossed over. As another juror put it: "I wouldn't want either of these lawyers representing me in court."

Finding the right verdict isn't always easy.

I got paneled on a second degree assault case early, but was dismissed and was not happy to get paneled on a second case. I even wore a suit and tie, thinking it would lessen the chances of being selected (after all, they said to wear professional clothes).

I did not go so far as to wear a bow tie (a warning sign to both lawyers), or to imply that I couldn't be objective.

:smoke:

I submitted a "not guilty" verdict in a Sexual Abuse case. The state didn't have enough for a parking ticket, let alone a guilty verdict. It was truly sad that they even wasted our time.

After the case, the Judge came into the jury room and told us he agreed with our verdict.

RL

"I'd rather be rich and guilty than poor and innocent in American." Says volumes, doesn't it?

makes me really very mad is for some jury member to say "Well, he may not be guilty of this crime but he probably committed other crimes so we need to get him off the streets."

I always go ballistic when I hear that and the result is either innocent or a hung jury.

:hi:

I am a criminal defense lawyyer and sometimes the jury really screw up. All in all though, I think juries do a pretty good job.

I was on a civil case about a year ago and it was very interesting. We found a guilty verdice and had to asses damages. The process is interesting and I believe in it.

Yeah I know what you mean - a lot of crim. trials are very ambiguous. The police don't do their work, the prosecution tries to piece some ad hoc case together, and defense attorneys are sometimes ill prepared.

But the jury I still believe in. They aren't always perfect, but it's the best thing we got going.

He said the young man was "in the wrong place at the wrong time" and admitted that if he knew anything about the gun he was guilty (which wasn't at all clear from reading the law). No way I could send a 16-year-old to prison on the weak evidence they presented, even if he was guilty (which he might have been). They didn't even come close to proving it.

There were half a dozen lines of defense I could think of which weren't even brought up. That's why I didn't think he did a good job -- but he might have just approached it differently.

BTW, Prince Georges County (southeastern DC suburbs) is very racially mixed and it showed in the courtroom. The states' attorney was a goofy young black lawyer. The defense attorney was a good ol' boy. The judge was white (as am I), and most of the jury was black. Just to point out that the case did NOT break down along racial lines in the least. That in itself makes me happy.

Was the defense attorney a public defender, or a private hire?

but as a private lawyer, he might have been assigned it by the court or been doing the work pro bono.

If they throw every defense out that they can think of. The attorney risks confusing the jury, or getting jurors to think "He's protesting way too much. Why?" The defense attorney may have just figured "This is all I need to put on." Or the defense attorney might have been incompetent. No sense dulling Occam's Razor.

In any event, thanks for your service. It sounds like you decided just as you swore your oath as a jury to decide: You had a reasonable doubt about the defendant's guilt and returned your verdict accordingly.

I would have voted guilty had it been proven he broke the law. And what was even more pleasing was that all the other jurors would have, too.

On the defense, I didn't describe it well. It wasn't so much a matter of throwing out possibly conflicting lines of defense as emphasizing how far the prosecution fell of providing proof, and suggesing lines of thought that would create a tremendous amount of reasonable doubt.