Jury Pullification Definitions

Eyewitness evidence has always been considering critical information when it comes to court trials and convictions. But how reliable are eyewitnesses? Scientific research has shown that eyewitness’s memories are often not accurate or reliable. Human memory is very malleable and is easily changed by suggestion. Relying on eyewitness evidence instead of scientific data often leads to wrongful convictions. Scientific evidence is much more reliable, and should be more important in court cases than eyewitness evidence.

Eyewitness testimony has long been viewed as important evidence in court cases. The general population believes eyewitness identification more than any other evidence, even if the witness account is conflicting with the other evidence presented. Studies show that eyewitness testimony is unreliable, and yet it is still considered the most important form of evidence. People think that if a person says they saw something then it must have happened. Currently there are no universal guidelines on how to obtain and present such evidence. The purpose of this paper is to explain why eyewitness testimony is unreliable, and discuss the proposed guidelines on how law enforcement agencies should gather identifications, as well how

The reliability if an eyewitness testimony is questionable. The witness may be so certain that the person that thy are pointing out is one hundred per cent the suspect or they could be so certain when it comes to retelling the incident, although these people are so sure on what it is they are doing, their testimony cannot always accurate. Due to the lack of accuracy with eyewitness

Information is the lifeblood of a criminal investigation. The ability of investigators to obtain useful and accurate information from eyewitnesses of crimes is crucial to effective law enforcement, yet full and accurate recall is difficult to achieve (Stewart, 1985). Such elicitation of complete and accurate recall from people is important in many aspects of life; specifically, eyewitness recall may determine whether a case is solved. Principle advocates of the cognitive interview (Fisher, Geiselman, Holland & MacKinnon,

Jury Nullification is the process that allows members of the juror to acquit a defendant for crimes they do not feel is grounds for punishment. Although, many jurors may not know this is an option to many cases, it is still an option. If citizens use this option in many of the courtroom proceedings, there will be fewer people who are serving time in prison. On the other hand, this does interfere with the decision- making process. This paper will explain whether ethnicity influences courtroom proceedings and judicial practices. It will summarize the arguments for and against ethnicity-based jury nullification. Including contemporary examples of

When the criminal is caught most of the time, they are going to tell a big fat lie. This is when police officers start to question and interrogate the suspect. The technology they use to determine if the suspect is fibbing is called a polygraph (Foster, 2009). The hit television show The first 48 show both interrogating and polygraph usage. The machine measures blood pressure, pulse, breathing, skin conductivity during questioning, and body temperature (Foster, 2009). The needles Ink the paper and if the suspect lies the polygraph goes crazy. However, it is not 100% trustworthy but with the advanced technology I have

In support of this position, the government cited two decided decisions by the Court holding that the failure to object to a jury instruction is not controlling “for purposes of appellate review of the denial of a directed verdict or judgment notwithstanding the verdict.” Rather, the question of whether a party is entitled to a directed verdict “depends upon the sufficiency of the evidence up to that point in the trial,” not of the content of jury instructions, which are “outside the scope of that analysis.”

Jury nullification is when a jury returns a not guilty verdict, even when they believe that a defendant is guilty of the charge for which they are being prosecuted (Hall, 2015). A defendant can argue that the jury disregarded the law if the law is viewed as harsh or unfavorable (Hall, 2015). A prosecutor, nor a judge, may ask a jury to nullify. A jury can only be instructed to consider nullification by the defense (Hall, 2015). In the case of United States v. Dougherty (1972), nine people, including Dougherty, broke into a chemical company, damaging property as a way to protest the company’s support of the Vietnam War (United States v. Dougherty, n.d.).

You are a Juror on a 1st degree murder trial. The defendant is a sixty-year-old man who helped his terminally ill wife pass on once she lost almost all satisfaction of life, was in constant pain, and continued to spiral downhill quickly. He explained that she asked him to assist her out of her misery and others within the family can testify to it. While the law may tell you that he is guilty and must render a guilty verdict, there is some wiggle room referred to as jury nullification. Jury nullification would allow you, the juror, to find the defendant not guilty because the verdict’s result would go against the juror’s sense of morality. Jury nullification can however raise multiple moral dilemmas and has throughout time. Jury

Also, due to the Brain scans being “70 to 90 per cent” accurate, this producing a defence for a defendant to argue that the scan in inaccurate, causing the process of scans to be a waste of time. As previously seen In R v Béland the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the results of a polygraph examination are not admissible as evidence. As the test had relied upon ones sweat and heart palpitations which delivered inaccurate results. This has also been seen to be the reason why polygraph examinations were excluded as evidence in the English Criminal justice system. Therefore

Initially, the trial judge instructs the jurors of their responsibility in the observance of the law, and at the conclusion of trial, the judge and the involved parties are not permitted in closing arguments to persuade the jury to blatantly disregard the law (Hall, 2015). Jury nullification occurs when jurors do not convict the defendant because they are convinced the crime or punishment is too harsh or unfavorable (Hall, 2015). Furthermore, this rule only applies to the defense, specifically when the defense has an interest in arguing that the jury should acquit and not follow the law, regardless of guilt (Hall, 2015). Jury nullification is not permitted in most, if not all jurisdictions, and it applies to both the prosecution and the

Eyewitness identification and testimony play a huge role in the criminal justice system today, but skepticism of eyewitnesses has been growing. Forensic evidence has been used to undermine the reliability of eyewitness testimony, and the leading cause of false convictions in the United States is due to misidentifications by eyewitnesses. The role of eyewitness testimony in producing false confessions and the factors that contribute to the unreliability of these eyewitness testimonies are sending innocent people to prison, and changes are being made in order to reform these faulty identification procedures.

The Examiner made use of a Lafayette LX4000 multi-channel computerised polygraph instrument, capable of simultaneous and continuous recording of respiration, galvanic skin response, relative blood volume and heart rate.

According to the dictionary, “polygraph is a machine designed to detect and record changes in physiological characteristics such as a person’s pulse and breathing rates. It is used especially as a lie detector.” (Online Dictionary, 2015). Although it is the most widely used method, field studies have shown that the success rate of using polygraph has its average accuracy neighbourhood of 90% (Ioannis Pavlidis 2002). This is not a satisfactory result with its numerous drawback that affect the accuracy of polygraph test. The technology used in polygraph are based on contact sensors and heuristic process of analysing signals by expert polygrapher (Benjamin Kleinmuntz 1984). The process lead to high levels of stress to a subject which can trigger false-positive conclusion (Kevin K. Park 2013). Besides, Tsiamyrtzis also claimed that the process is perform manually by several expert which resulting a slow analysis that need to be reconcile (Tsiamyrtzis, Dowdall et al. 2006). Another drawback is that the need of an expert to run polygraph testing is crucial in order to get a credibility assessment of the results. Therefore, a new approach is vital for detecting deception and that is the thermal imaging which can act as a secondary support to the

The polygraph test is one of the most controversial criminal investigative techniques of all-time. From the initial years of the invention to today, there is not a consensus about the investigative tool. That is why there are many people for and against the administration of polygraph tests. Therefore, in order to develop a clear picture of the polygraph test the history of the test must be established. Although, there are many sources that have well documented concerns about the invention, the polygraph test is still around after almost 80 years.