Friday, March 17, 2006
Time to abolish the jury system
Don't know alot about Britain's 3-judge system, but all in favor of replacing today's amateur jury system with professional judges. Finished wasting 2 days for a DUI trial. According to the judge, he realized that El Segundo cops often video tape DUI stops, so he asked for the tape & the attorneys settled the case after we cooled our heels for 1 hour out in the hallway.
My biggest argument is the waste of productivity. Wednesday a group of 120 of us piffled away the day. Seemed like a good cross-section: i chatted with a doctor, another fellow was a sole proprietor of a business, a lady was 1 of 2 office workers and asked to be excused because the other lady in the office was on vacation (judge refused). Total up how many wasted manhours are sucked up by a DUI case. At least make some distinction between types of crimes and for lessor offences such as a DUI make them a judge, not jury, case.
The argument given by a judge in her pep talk had to do with conditions in Britain back in 1780 (abuses by a judge pushed Patrick Henry to push for part of current system: well times have changed - our legal system should adopt.
My biggest argument is the waste of productivity. Wednesday a group of 120 of us piffled away the day. Seemed like a good cross-section: i chatted with a doctor, another fellow was a sole proprietor of a business, a lady was 1 of 2 office workers and asked to be excused because the other lady in the office was on vacation (judge refused). Total up how many wasted manhours are sucked up by a DUI case. At least make some distinction between types of crimes and for lessor offences such as a DUI make them a judge, not jury, case.
The argument given by a judge in her pep talk had to do with conditions in Britain back in 1780 (abuses by a judge pushed Patrick Henry to push for part of current system: well times have changed - our legal system should adopt.
