re: Louisiana's Non-Unanimous Jury Verdict - SB243

Both the state Republican and Democratic parties have openly endorsed the amendment, the DAs association is taking no position, and every single state in the union requires more votes for a verdict than we do, with 48 states and the federal system requiring unanimity, yet some on this board want to act like requiring jury unanimity is utter lunacy.

Some of you never cease to amaze me

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I like it the way it is now. Everyone in Louisiana is only 1-2 degrees separated from each other due to the low migration into the state from outside. This allows for a prosecution to fairly put forth a case to a jury where at least someone knows someone who knows the defendant.

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Anyone who so much as knows the defendant would be struck for cause. That's a non-issue.

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Look. I get it. You want your job to be easier. You want to be able to identify that one person in the jury to focus your efforts on. frick doing the work necessary for 3...I just need to find one person so fricking stupid, or so fricking militantly biased against the cops or prosecutors, that I can guarantee a walk.

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If this scenario is so obvious, why wouldn't the ADA have struck that person?

The reality is that any obviously "pro defense" or "pro state" juror would have already been struck by one of the sides. The issue with only requiring 10-2 for a verdict isn't that more people didn't get convinced; the issue is that they don't even have to listen to the position of those in the minority. Initial vote goes 10-2? No deliberation at all.

That's hardly the type of jury system our founders envisioned.

Also, I stated my bias clearly in the OP, but some of you are being absurd with it. Something like 97% of criminal cases are resolved short of trial. While this change would have a small impact on my professional life, that has practically nothing to do with why I support it so strongly.

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If this scenario is so obvious, why wouldn't the ADA have struck that person?

The reality is that any obviously "pro defense" or "pro state" juror would have already been struck by one of the sides.

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Maybe you've heard of Batson? I suspect that in the current BLM/"hands up don't shoot" climate, ADAs are damned gun-shy about striking a juror of the same race as a minority defendant absent BLATANTLY OBVIOUS bias.

i got a jury summons for St. Bernard last week, and i will bring this up in voir dire every time until the law is changed...

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Anyone who so much as knows the defendant would be struck for cause. That's a non-issue.

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Yeah. I know. My point is that, if I were on a jury in NOLA of BR, it would take approx 2 days before I got a phone call from someone I know who knows the defendant.

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if I were on a jury in NOLA of BR, it would take approx 2 days before I got a phone call from someone I know who knows the defendant.

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I think I get your point.

The entire state of Louisiana has 2 million less population than the DFW metroplex.

When you are talking about the Parish level, odds are you know someone who knows someone. It's just a smaller world.

Rhode Island must be worse. Can you imagine an entire state of around 1 million? Everyone must know everyone.

In every jury trial I've conducted/witnessed, someone in the jury venire knew someone: the defendant, one of the attorneys, the judge, one of the witnesses, etc. It's a question asked at the beginning of every panel. Anyone who says yes is asked if that personal relationship could potentially bias their judgment. If they say yes, they are stricken for cause. If they say no, they will probably still be stricken for cause. But if not, they will almost certainly be a peremptory strike for one side.

And in cases in which the person is too locally well known, it will simply be moved to a different venue.

I'm a bit surprised, as I've literally never heard this brought up in the context of unanimous jury verdicts before

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I prefer making it harder to convict

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"It is Better For 100 Guilty Men to Go Free Than One Innocent Man Go To Prison."

This should always be the motto. The threshold should always be high.

It's the prosecution's duty to convince all jurors...the burden is and always should be on the prosecution. Defense doesn't have to prove their innoncence, it's the opposite.

And unanimous verdicts aren't as difficult to obtain as one would think. Group think comes into play and peer pressure in the deliberations and most jurors just go along.

It's difficult to actually be a hold-out. People want to go home. It actually takes courage if you really believe the State hasn't proven its case to hold-out.

And people trust authority. Feds never lose cases because they take easy ones and jurors inherently trust whatever the Feds say.

The State already has it easy enough to convict with all their resources, trust of authority and group think.

There's no reason to make it easier with 10-2.

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i got a jury summons for St. Bernard last week, and i will bring this up in voir dire every time until the law is changed...

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St Bernard is actually very good example of where this could be an issue. Unless it’s some random hood rat from down the road, there’s no way people in St Bernard are separated by more than 2-3 people.