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TRIAL BY JURY
The wrongful convictions of ten sus- pected IRA members nearly 20 years ago culminated this week in a recommendation by a Royal Commission for a comprehen- sive overhaul of the entire criminal justice system. There was no suggestion that the juries were at fault in either the Guildford or Birmingham cases. They reached under- standable conclusions from the fabricated evidence with which they were presented. However, reforms of the jury system and the role of the jury figure prominently in the Commission's suggestions. Juries should, it says, be properly informed by the judge about uncorroborated confessions, and told to draw adverse conclusions about the failure of the defence to disclose its case before a trial. Both of these reforms would allow juries a better chance of cor- rectly determining guilt or innocence. Other jury reforms suggested by the Royal Commission are not, though, so unequivo- cally desirable.
The purpose of including three people from ethnic minorities on certain juries is to ensure verdicts are not reached on the basis of racial prejudice. It is, though, a confusing concept. Could an Australian, or an American demand three Australians or Americans on his jury, or would the pro- posed new right discriminate between eth- nicity and nationality? If so, where would that leave Jews and Rastafarians? Should homosexuals, the disabled, and other minorities be allowed the right to have three soul mates on any jury trying them too? Apart from the potential for absurdity, such a concept contravenes the idea of equality before the law.
The proposed removal of the automatic right to a jury trial is equally questionable. It is undoubtedly wasteful for people whose guilt — or innocence — is obvious to mag- istrates to have to be sent on for an expen- sive trial by jury. Yet one reason why peo- ple elect for a jury trial is that they have greater confidence in their peers to find them not guilty than in a bench. High acquittal rates in some areas have passed into folklore. The reputation juries have acquired in some areas for instinctive dis- trust of and hostility towards the police are enough to persuade some criminals to take a chance with such trials. The national acquittal rate for defendants pleading not guilty to all counts and being found not guilty on all counts is 56 per cent. On the Northern Circuit the figure is a breathtak- ing 63 per cent, on the Western 49 per cent. Shortly before it reported, the Royal Commission published a survey suggesting overwhelming satisfaction with the jury sys- tem among the public and those who have served on them. But the existing system is far from satisfactory. It does not truly reflect the balance of society. The middle classes are notorious evaders of jury ser- vice. This has been noted by the Commis- sion. One proposal urges review of the compensation paid for loss of income while sitting on juries. This is long overdue. The increase in numbers of small businesses in the 1980s effectively removed thousands of self-employed people from those willing to sit on juries, since with no one else to mind the shop — in many cases literally — jury service threatened their livelihoods.
The employed middle classes have no such excuses. Managers routinely ask for deferrals or even exemptions for dispens- able staff purely because of inconvenience. The undue liberality of the system has meant that such requests have often been granted. The Commission now urges courts to take the trouble to find dates when a potential juror can serve; it will be hard to maintain that the boss is going on holiday for the whole year.
But this, and other proposed jury reforms, do not go far enough. The Royal Commission proposes that those on bail should be barred — which is eminently sen- sible — and that potential jurors should be compelled to list previous convictions when replying to a summons for jury service. At the moment, anyone who, not less than ten years before being summoned, has served less than five years in jail can be a juror. As the moral base of society erodes, the chances of finding 12 good men and women and true will erode too.
The Government should bar for life any- one with a criminal record from sitting on a jury. It should raise the age limit from 70 to 75 to take advantage of the many elderly, experienced good citizens who would wish to play a part in the judicial process. Given the numerous anecdotal reports of jurors who have trouble reading the oath, a basic literacy test should be given to help ensure that written evidence can be properly con- sidered. And, to ensure that jurors are suf- ficiently mature to decide whether one of their peers should be deprived of his or her reputation and, perhaps, liberty, the mini- mum age for jury service should be 25.
The Royal Commission has not been complacent about juries. The Government must recognise, though, that there is little point in making the rest of the police and judicial processes watertight if the stan- dards of the juries that decide guilt or inno- cence are allowed to slip further. It should learn from other mistakes in this area that action before a problem becomes a hazard is infinitely preferable to action afterwards.
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