"Jury System; a system in which the verdict in a legal case is decided by a jury on the basis of evidence submitted to it in court." Starting at eighteen, you become eligible for jury duty – something many have to do as one of our civic duties, however, it wasn 't always this way. As far as historians know, the jury was established by William the Conqueror who brought it to England from Normandy. However, this system that he brought was nothing more than a system that had witnesses who knew of the matter in question to tell the court what they knew. It 's a known fact that our courts and laws have changed and evolved since when we first created them, otherwise lynching and stoning would still be acceptable punishments for varying crimes. The biggest difference between the court systems and juries then and now is that the Catholic Church had a lot of say in court decisions. Prior to the 12th century, the Catholic church dominated the legal system. The church had say in what punishments were acceptable and …show more content…
Whether it was ‘trial by ordeal ', King John 's reign before the Magna Carta, or times were the church 's say was final, many agree that the forms of convicting someone or punishing someone was very different than what we know now. After the establishment of Jamestown and other colonies, a crime took a spike without a strong sense of consequences to actions. "In America, the Massachusetts Bay Colony impanelled the first Grand Jury in 1635 to consider cases of murder, robbery and wife beating." After the American Revolution and America had gained its independence, we kept similar courts as England, however; our juries were different. In England, not all cases had the right to a jury, and this angered the colonists and was a factor in the revolt. After America won the revolution, the right to a jury was added to the constitution in several instances so it could no longer be denied. A few of these places were: Article III and the fifth, sixth, and
The clear distinction between a jury and a judge is among the key specifications of the seventh amendment. This distinction in the law is termed as functions. According to the amendment, the judge is designated to try the law whereas the jury can try according to facts. This distinguishing between the law and fact is important as it gives the legitimacy to the decree of juries. At the same time, the amendment prevents from violation of the justified legal anticipations of the
They both dealt with land disputes between tenants and heard mostly petty crimes. Finally there was the Ecclesiastical court which dealt with crimes committed by the clergy, land disputes concerning the church and moral crimes. This effective structure ensured royal authority was restored. The question of proof combined with testifying under oath, introduction of juries and the Mort d’ ancestor changed the way how people were found guilt and convicted. For Henry the justice system was the most important and efficient way in asserting royal authority.
Search warrants were given to British inspectors to search ships. Rule breakers didn’t receive trial by jury, but they were handed over to the British admiralty courts. The admiralty courts dealt with salvage insurance property. There was no jury; just judge appointed by government. British government wanted to move custom cases into the court like smuggling.
People believed that god’s judgement decided whether you were guilty or not. Trial by combat would also be used in the middle ages. This wasn’t very fair because someone could accuse a person with a disadvantage who would obviously lose. This would cause many thefts. “Henry offered a fairer, more logical type of trial: trial by jury.”
The jury system originated in England hundreds of years ago. The colonists brought the jury system from England to the United States. In 1733, John Zenger, a printer, printed a newspaper critical for the British Government. His attorney convinced the jury to be in favor for Zenger because his criticisms were true. After this trial, it gave ordinary citizens the freedom of speech and the power to go against the king.
Our rejection of simple-majority jury decisions, I believe, was deeply-rooted. In the 1700’s, Sir William Blackstone made his opinion clear that a jury trial was the most “transcendent privilege” any person can hope for. 3 Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 379 (1768). That no state can take away your property or liberty without the “unanimous consent of twelve of his neighbors and equals,” was a great comfort to Blackstone, as it should be to all of us. Id. John Adams believed that a unanimous jury is the thing that “preserves the rights of mankind.”
Another reason citizens question juries is that they have bias from personal experience or the media. The defendant and the prosecution criticize the jury system because the actual jurors may not understand the situation from any point of view because they come from different lifestyles (Doc E). The American jury system is not a good idea anymore because juries are not experts in law, they have bias, and are not “a jury of peers”. Because jurors are not experts in law, they are subject to be
By the 18th century, all colonies, except for one, had legislatures like the English Parliament. Twenty years about the arrival of the Virginia Company Charter, Virginia colonists had adapted English criminal justice practices to the New World. Most procedures dealing with indictment, arrest, bail, trial, judgement, and execution of sentence were familiar to an Englishmen. The courts tried minor criminal case, felony cases were heard at the General Court. “Dales Laws” were laws that expected colonists to attend daily church services under penalty of 6 months service in the of the galleys of Virginia company ships, but if you missed Sunday services repeatedly you could receive the death penalty.
The ways they handled cases of homicide and witchcraft to determine who was at fault or guilty was a travesty. If someone accused another with homicide and could not give convincing evidence the accuser was to be killed. In the case of witchcraft if the accuser could not bring evidence they would test the accused in the river ordeal. If the river overwhelmed the man, the accuser would be given estate of the accused and if he survived the accuser would be killed and the accused would be given his estate. This very flawed for the fact that someone could use to obtain wealth by accusing a wealthy, older man as the
Citizen Required To Serve? Jury a group of citizens sworn to give a verdict in a legal case on the basis of evidence submitted to them in court. Being able to serve on a jury is an absolute privilege to do for some and one thing that makes this country very different and unique from others. Serving on a jury should not be required for citizens. Some people believe serving on a jury should be a requirement for every citizen.
There are many limitations regarding Jurors. Jurors have many responsibilities while involved in a trial. They decide the future for the people affected by the case. Sequestering jurors helps protect them from forming biased opinions. The jurors are told to stay away from the news and other media because they need to remain neutral, unbiased, and only reach a verdict based on the facts of the case.
Let us break down what justice is; justice is behaviour that is just or fair. So the justice system is the system that enforces the law which involves apprehending the accused, prosecuting the accused, defending the accused, sentencing and punishing the guilty. The justice system makes sure that every citizen is heard for and is helped according to what has happened to them. The criminal justice system today When a person commits a crime there are different levels of punishment and decision making if a person has committed a minor crime like speeding, littering, shoplifting, prostitution, vandalism being drunk, possession of drugs etc.
While we prefer life in jail, they preferred death. To conclude, a significant extent of the nature of crime and punishment changed between social classes and over the years since the Medieval Period. This is seen through the significant groups that were involved in medieval crime and punishment, the effects of a person’s social class on crime and punishment, the sort of crime each punishment was used for and the difference between crime and punishments between the Medieval Period and today. The Medieval Period lasted from 476 CE to 1453 CE, with different punishments for each crime committed by different social
Today the criminal justice system functions upon the police,the courts, and the corrections, but back then in the beginning of criminal justice people didn’t have this type of structure. They shaped their structure using religion before laws and rules were established in the United States. Population started to increase and soon people had to make laws to uphold values of mortality because religion became less frequent. Due to this change more laws and violations were made.
This essay will briefly discuss the role of the jury and how it works, from the principle behind it, to the method with which members are selected, and to the powers available to jurors. Moreover, it will outline advantages and disadvantages of trial by jury, and it will point out a couple of ways which could ameliorate this type of trial. Trial by jury has been a part of the criminal justice system since the 12th century (Davies, 2015), it is considered an ancient right and a symbol of liberty (Hostettler, 2004). It creates no precedent and it can decide challenging cases equitably without making bad law, it also brings members of the public into the administration of justice and into an understanding of legal and human rights (Hostettler,