Juries: should there be an equal male:female split for sexual assault cases?

[squeaver]

I've just finished jury service. Obviously there are certain things I can't discuss but it was a sexual assault case and I strongly believe the verdict was influenced by the jury having two women and 10 men.

Does anyone know if there is/has been any campaigning on this? Or any research? I can't find anything online.

I would be really happy to share my experience with someone if it could help in any way.

I've heard (but can't remember where or when) that woman can be less likely to find guilty than men on juries.

The idea of removing women (and men) who have been sexually assaulted is bonkers though. That's most of us! And they aren't asking the men if they've sexually assaulted anyone I assume...

Well exactly, and men without a conviction are hardly going to admit it, are they.

You are therefore selecting from men and the women who haven't been assaulted. Both these groups are going to lack experience to empathise with the victim

A juror should not be empathising with the victim or basing their decision on their own experiences.

A male friend many years ago sat on a jury for a serious sexual assault. He ended up needing therapy afterwards for PTSD as he found the entire thing so traumatic (he'd had a very sheltered life and zero idea such things happened). Obviously I don't know the details but I do know some of the truama he struggled with just being on the jury wasnt helped by some attitudes of the women there, when we discussed it, I remember he couldn't understand why comments kept being made about how attractive the man was (so he couldn't possibly have done it) and the woman ugly (so couldn't possibly be a victim).

I know in my dealings regarding things I've gone through relating to assault I've had some dreadful things said to me by women as well as men, sometimes women have been worse.

Miss Barbary they don't filter out the people who empathise with the accused!

Also the idea that having been sexually assaulted (pretty much all women) means that you are incapable of being impartial sounds pretty misogynistic to me.

Do they remove people who have been burgled from those juries?

As defence counsel we want women on the jury as they generally in sex assault cases are the harshest critics of the female victims.

Men tend to be more sympathetic to women

I've watched a jury closely in a courtroom. When the verdict came back the males looked more upset than the females.

@NiceGerbil

Miss Barbary they don't filter out the people who empathise with the accused!

Also the idea that having been sexually assaulted (pretty much all women) means that you are incapable of being impartial sounds pretty misogynistic to me.

Do they remove people who have been burgled from those juries?

Eh? What are you on about?

I quoted someone who said juries should empathise with the victim. I said no they shouldn't. I never said anything about weeding anyone out.

As for the rest of your post- why are you addressing those posts at me?

Oh sorry I must have misread.

But I've had a look- you said this I think?

'A juror should not be empathising with the victim or basing their decision on their own experiences'

That's what my post was about.

@NiceGerbil

Oh sorry I must have misread.

But I've had a look- you said this I think?

'A juror should not be empathising with the victim or basing their decision on their own experiences'

That's what my post was about.

Yes , I said that. I don't understand what point you are making.

Are you objecting to the suggestion that jurors should be objective?

And I've what the rest of your original post is supposed to mean in relation to anything I said.

I sadly dont think it would matter. Ive read too many threads on here filled with female apologists for rapists and abusers.

Women can just as judgey about other women as men can. In many cases they can be worse.

Unlike others on this thread, my experience of Jury Service did give me confidence in the system. We had a historic CSA case which as you can imagine is one of the most difficult because hard evidence is generally long-gone. I remain confident that our decision to convict was the right one.

The attempted rape case the previous week (in which I did not sit) also resulted in a conviction. Attempted rape, like attempted murder is difficult to prove because the prosecution has to show how far the defendant intended to go. Again the defendant was convicted on all charges.

I used to be in favour of jury service until I actually watched a court case and was genuinely shocked at the verdict.

I don't think juries are capable of weighing up evidence and truly understanding the concept of 'beyond reasonable doubt'.

I'd like to see juries abolished and judges trained in evaluating evidence to give their verdict. I would also like to see reasons presented for the verdict, so that you can see why a verdict was reached and can be challenged if necessary.

Sorry OP, this doesn't really address your question. My view is that juries are too susceptible to outside influences (eg what they've seen on TV or read in the papers) and not capable of putting aside their own feelings to rationally accept the arguments. I think this applies to men and women.

For instance it's been proven that a man with a 'baby face' is more likely to be found innocent than a man with sharper features.

As long as we have jury service I believe we are going to have very dubious decisions made as a matter of course.

*evaluate the arguments, that should say, not accept.

@Thelnebriati Thanks for sharing the Bindel piece. I think there's a lot to be said for her arguments.

I suppose everyone's experience is different and, maybe, that proves the system works. I honestly don't know.

I fully understand the need for keeping discussions confidential too but, in my case, I genuinely believe the CPS and the police would benefit from understanding why things panned out the way they did.

Whilst it would be better, in fact they call up a random group, far more than the 12 they need for each slot, then people ask to be let off serving - I suspect more women asked to be excused due to childcare reasons.

@EdgeOfACoin Your point about juries being susceptible to outside influences was definitely true in my case. Far too many amateur CSIs.

The idea of removing women (and men) who have been sexually assaulted is bonkers though.

They don't remove women who have been sexually assaulted. I think you have misunderstood a previous posters comments about women requesting to be excused from jury service on the grounds that their history of sexual assault would make the experience too distressing for them.