I’ve bee watching the Brooks vs state trial, and before he makes his closing argument, the judge tells him NOT to inform the jury of their power to nullify the law.
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Even if the jury believes there is enough evidence to convict the defendant as charged, if they don’t agree with the charges, for example if there were extenuating circumstances that the jury views as excusing the crime, they can still find the defendant innocent.
I don’t know anything about this trial you’re watching. But jury nullification simply means that the jurists understand the law and (informally) agree that the law as written applies to the crimes that the prosecution alleges. But they refuse to apply the law as written because they believe that the law is immoral or wrongly applied in some way and so they side with the defendant.
It’s basically the idea that the jury can rule however they want. Even if the accused is guilty, the jury can still rule that they’re not guilty. CGP Grey made a great video about it explaining the whole concept. Check it out here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uqH_Y1TupoQ
The jury is meant to make a decision based on evidence and the law.
However, the jury’s decision is unaccountable to any authority.
So the jury could make a decision based on any other basis. Hyptohetically, they might: disagree with the law, ignore evidence that is clearly true, be prejudiced, be extra compassionate, or choose based on the flip of a coin.
The jury is therefore ‘nullifying’ the law if they do this, rather than considering matters of evidence and law.
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This could arguably be a good thing, for instance, if a law is unjust, a jury can refuse to enforce it.
Or it could be a bad thing, for instance, if a jury is racist, they could convict someone just because they want to remove people of the defendant’s race from society.
Jury nullification is when a jury finds for “not guilty” even though they know that the defendant is actually guilty. The jury can essentially nullify the law and find for whatever they want.
For example if the father of a raped child kills the child rapist and end up in court for murder the jury might sympathise with the defendant enough to say that actually he did not do the murder at all even with clear evidence. Nobody is allowed to challenge the jury in their verdicts so when they say the father is not guilty he have to be released.
There is however a possibility of a mistrial. If someone explains jury nullification to the jury members then this could be jury tampering, contempt of court and make the jury members unable to stand as jury members. So even though it can be a very powerful defence the lawyer can not openly go for this defence.
The jury is free to declare “guilty” or “not guilty” at the end of the case. They are not bound by the facts of the case or the letter of the law in that, even if they are supposed to take them into account. If the truth would be clear to any reasonable observer, but the jury’s verdict disagrees, that is nullification.
A Jury can vote “not guilty” for any reason they deem fit. They are not obligated to make a decision based only on the law and facts — no matter what the judge might say.
Ultimately, the jury is charged with determining whether or not an individual is guilty of a crime, not if they are merely guilty of breaking the law. If the jury feels a law is unjust, they can render a not guilty verdict.
This has both good and bad implications. A good implication is if a jury feels that a law or the associated punishment is unjust, they can just return a not guilty verdict. For example, a law making it illegal to defend yourself from a rapist, or a death sentence for petty theft.
A bad implication is that the jury may feel a law is unjust even if its not. For example, lots of crimes against black people were nullified by racist juries during Jim Crow — and these kinds of things still happen today.
Juries are the ultimate arbiter of justice in our (U.S.) legal system. This serves as a check on government overreach, but does not always result in the just outcome. On balance, it is necessary.
Jury nullification exists because of two principles at work. One, a jury cannot be punished for their verdicts. The jury is meant to decide the truth of the matter and it is assumed that they will do so. Punishing them for a verdict the judge doesn’t like would taint the justice system.
Two: double jeopardy. In many systems of law, a person cannot be tried again for the same crime if a Not Guilty verdict is rendered. The US gets around that in a way because, at any given moment, there are at least three governments in charge of you: county, state, and federal. Usually, there’s a local or city government as well, so all four could charge you with the same crime, but usually only one or two will take a stab at it.
If a person cannot be tried again, and no one will be arrested for handing down a verdict, you have four possible outcomes in a trial. The Jury knows you’re guilty, so they render Guilty. The jury knows you’re not guilty, so they render Not Guilty. The jury could also know you commited the crime, but render a Not Guilty verdict for any number of reasons (sympathy with the victim, disagreement with the law, unreasonable distrust of the system, or even racism or sexism). The jury could also be unsure if you commited the crime or be certain you’re innocent, and still hand down a Guilty verdict, maybe due to some bias against the accused or “well, she must have done *something*!” Then, assuming the judge doesn’t have good reason to believe the jury is tainted, the person walks free or goes to jail to wait for their appeal.
The most famous cases of jury nullification in the US came during the run-up to the Civil War. In 1850, the South managed to get a Federal law passed that said escaped slaves had to be returned to their owners. Bounty hunters from the south would arrest escaped slaves, or free black people who they just called escaped slaves, and take them to court, demanding they be extradicted to the South. Abolitionists on the juries would vote Not Guilty because they felt the law was unjust. Slavery supporters would vote Guilty, no matter whether the bounty hunter had proof that the person accused was a runaway slave or not.
All in all, it’s a really dangerous tool that the general public can wield to determine how the law is applied. That’s why juries are instructed at the start of the trial that they are to only decide based on the evidence presented and the law as they are told about. If it gets out that a jury is likely to try nullifcation, a mistrial can be declared and a new jury selected.
Basically, a jury has final say on whether someone is convicted of a crime. But they are not able to be punished based on their decision.
Normally, a jury is meant to look at evidence, look at the laws, and decide based on that. But the jury doesn’t have to do it that way. The “jury” can “nullify” the law as they see fit.
If all evidence says you did the crime, but the jury doesn’t feel you deserve to be punished for it, you’re off scot free. If all the evidence says you didn’t do the crime, but the jury hates your guts, they can just decide you’re guilty regardless.
On one hand, this is a good feature of the law. It means that if a law is unjust, the people can ignore it without repercussions. On the other, this is a very dangerous feature. It means that if the jury itself is unjust (racist, sexist, etc.) the law can’t stop them.
This is why court is treated like a performance, and why image is everything. Even if you did everything right, if the jury thinks you’re a scum bag, you’re screwed.
Let’s say someone passed a law that pretty much everyone else thought was stupid. Let’s say it’s a law that days you can’t stay up past Midnight.
Someone was caught, on camera, well after midnight, and arrested. In court, they request a jury trial. During testimony, all of the evidence points to the fact that the defendant broke the stupid law.
The jury delibrates and decides the law really is stupid, but the person was caught and must be guilty. Instead of returning a guilty verdict, they come out and say, “Not guilty,” and the person goes free.
Now, prosecutors are concerned. Their reputations are really important to them and if they lose too many cases they could lose their jobs. They can’t figure out where they went wrong because they had this person dead to rights. So they decide not to prosecute this law anymore and risk further damage to their own reputation and win / loss ratio. They might even ask the police not to arrest people for that law, because they won’t be prosecuted or convicted anyway.
This, my dear 5yo, is called Jury Nullification. It’s how people can just refuse to accept stupid or silly laws like not staying up after Midnight. The law is nullified because anyone can break it without punishment.
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