Juries Flashcards
What amendment is important to voir dire?
The sixth guarantees juries will comprise of citizens who can be impartial triers of fact – purpose of jury selection/voir dire.
What is a limited voir dire?
When only the judge is allowed to ask questions of the venirepersons. Usually a few q’s that produces yes/no answers.
These are likely to produce less honest responses or less likely to catch people who think the def has to prove their innocence/ppl related to law enforcement vs. innocent until proven guilty.
What is expanded voir dire?
When attorneys and judges ask questions, which is more likely to yield open-ended responses. They usually ask it in open court, but venirepersons can answer personal q’s at the bench. Attorneys can give questionnaires.
Do attorneys select jurors?
No, they remove them from the pool using challenges for cause and preemptory challenges.
What is a challenge for cause?
When an attorney has reason to believe bias or prejudice would prevent impartiality. The judge has to agree. Unlimited in how many attorney can request.
Death qualification: removing ppl who are all for or against the death penalty.
Juror rehab can occur - bias from an ext source vs. something personal/internal is easier to correct; watch out for overcorrection
What are preemptory challenges?
When attorneys remove potential jurors without having to provide justification for their removal. Might be used when judge declined a challenge for cause. Attorney has a prescribed number of these.
Bateson challenge: the defense thinks race plays role (reduce same-race match between jurors and def), def has demonstrate. Prosecution has to provide race-neutral reasons for challenging the venirepersons in question. Judge decides if race/discrimination played a role.
What is a traditional jury selection
Any strategy attorneys use to ID potential jurors who are favorable to their case. Superstition, stereotypes, body language, implicit theories of attitudes or personality, other hypotheses from experience. Research shows these are only slightly better than change.
What is scientific jury selection?
Use of social science methods to exercise challenges for cause and preemptory challenges.
Who is more likely to convict the def?
higher incomes, prestigious occupations, higher ed vs. low SES. When jurors don’t share racial group membership with def.
Who is more likely to convict for child sex abuse?
Men
Who is more likely to convict women who murdered an abusive partner?
Men.
Who tends to be influential in jury deliberations or to be chosen as the foreperson?
Men
Who is more likely to be pro capital punishment?
Whites, men, and republicans vs. blacks, democrats, and women
How does the Big 5 Personality predict jury decisions?
It doesn’t.
What measures are available to survey jurors?
Juror bias scale - poor predictive validity
Pretrial Juror Attitudes Questionnaire
Insanity Defense Attitudes-Revised
Attitudes Toward the DP Scale
