Topic > Jury Nullification: Power, Impact, and Controversy

At trial, your life is in the hands of strangers who decide your fate to walk free or be convicted and charged with a crime. Juries and judges are the main components of trials and differ at both the state and federal levels. A respectable citizen selected for jury duty can determine whether the evidence presented was strong enough to convict someone without full knowledge of the criminal justice system or the elements of a trial. In this article, juries and their powers will be analyzed, relevant cases relating to jury nullification will be expanded and evaluated, the role of the media on the discretion of juries and finally the instructions that judges do or cannot include for juries in court . Introduction Juries are a vital bodyIt is considered inconsistent with the jury's duty to render a verdict based solely on the law and facts of the case. The jury does not have the right to nullify, and the attorney is not permitted to present the concept of jury nullification to the jury. However, jury verdicts of acquittal are unassailable even when the verdict is inconsistent with the weight of the evidence and the instructions of the law. Jury nullification occurs when jurors acquit a defendant who is factually guilty because he or she does not agree with the law as written. Jury nullification also occurs when a jury convicts a defendant because it condemns the defendant or his actions, even though the evidence at trial showed that he technically broke no laws. For example, all-White juries in the post-Civil War South routinely convicted Black defendants accused of sexual crimes against White women despite minimal evidence of guilt (Streicker, 2014). Jury nullification only affects the individual case in which it is used, not the actual law. A consistent pattern of acquittals for prosecutions for a given crime can have the practical effect of invalidating a law, thus leading the Supreme Court to change a law or implement a new one From the Ferguson, Missouri, case of an officer who protected himself “mistakenly” in Texas In the DWI case involving the father who killed his children's killer, the media helps play a larger role on the scale to emphasize a greater attraction to the topic of the moment. With the increasing complexity and scope of the law, nullification means being a useful tool in a democratic society. However, a verdict should be based on the law decided by all the people, not by the few who make up the jury in a particular case. Although judges and jurists take different positions regarding jury nullification, the validity of the practice is believed to flow logically from different aspects of our justice system. In general, judges in most states are unwilling to even inform juries of the possibility of doing so