Jury nullification angers judges and prosecutors, but it’s all just part of the jurors’ role in protecting us from the government.
J.D. Tuccille writes:
Why juries do what they do is often a mystery, especially when they protectively interpose themselves between the government and a defendant. Outsiders can’t know what really goes on during jury deliberations, and jurors themselves have no way of knowing what truly motivates their colleagues to bring a not guilty verdict. That’s why jury nullification—acquittals of defendants who jurors believe didviolate the law but don’t deserve punishment, either because of specifics of the case or because jurors oppose the law in question—isn’t always obvious. It’s extraordinarily rare for jurors to tip their hands by setting people loose and then telling them they should keep up the good work, which is what happened in a recent case from New York.
But, as with much of what jurors do, nullification is important and potentially powerful.
Prosecutors and their groupies don’t really care why they were thwarted—just that they didn’t get their way. When refused convictions in high-profile criminal cases, they tend to act as if the government has been denied something to which it’s entitled by divine word and the laws of nature. Amidst whining by prosecutors about spending a week with “12 idiots,” and huffing by editorial boards over an “absurd verdict,” it’s difficult to know whether a not guilty verdict represents an act of juror rebellion or a simple statement that the government didn’t live up to its obligation to prove its arguments. Although, either way, jurors likely consider themselves to be doing what’s right.