I’m not from the US so I’m not quite sure if I got this right: During a court trial jury members are not allowed to be influenced by the outside so they are cut off from the society during the duration of the trial.
But how does this work. Taking the heard depp defamation trial as an example. The trial should last for 5 weeks in addition to a 10 days break. So are the jury members isolated for more than 6 weeks or how does this exactly work?
In: 9
Yes. Though not always invoked. Random person stealing a car with no news on it, the defense probably will not invoke the issue because the judge will not agree that there is an issue with outside influence. There are also other types of separation like having to report to a remote location to avoid being seen by media when entering the court house.
In a case where there would likely be outside influence and a large amount of media coverage, a jury will be sequestered(separated) in order to prevent outside influence. They will be given hotels, have guards to both protect them and prevent them from watching TV or going on the internet, get their mail screened, cannot talk to others about the case including other jurors.
In long trials they can try and do things to make it suck less, like take them to small outings like bowling or to the movies. Since the legal system is aware that people are people and morale will influence their ability to make reasonable decisions. Zimmerman trial I believe was a good few weeks long so they were under those strict conditions which is why the system tried to make it easier on the persons.
Latest Answers