Originally published at: Jury acquits protestors who toppled slaver statue in Bristol | Boing Boing
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Nice!
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Boy, Democracy really does have a foul taste in the mouth of our more powerful.
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It benefits conservatives, too: the traditional all-white American jury is an example of how nullification is encouraged when it suits the establishment.
I’m sure Jacob Rees-Mogg has just that in mind when takes what sounds on its surface like a reasonable position. It’s still weird and discouraging to see that this retrograde toff who hates anyone who isn’t rich and white and to the manor born is the voice of moderation on the British right in this matter.
In any case, very glad that the jury did the right thing here.
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It’s not strictly speaking jury nullification, as the law itself has a number of exceptions, one of which the jury presumably found covers the case (the use of reasonable force to prevent the crime of an indecent public display). We can’t know for sure because juries don’t discuss the grounds for their discussion in their verdicts.
The Tories are now talking about “plugging the loopholes” in their proposed new policing law that is meant to outlaw protests and make toppling of memorials to empire, white supremacy or slavery passible of 10 years’ prison, more than, say, rape.
Jury nullification did occur in the case of Extinction Rebellion protesting the HQ of Shell.
The odd thing is, the UK banned slavery a generation before the US, and that statue was privately funded by the Society of Merchant Venturers, a locally powerful medieval guild later endowed by Colston, in 1895, just as most Confederate monuments were built in the early 1900s as visible markers Jim Crow, not the ostensible claim or commemoration of history. The City of Bristol itself was not involved.
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I think it’s more likely that Rees-Mogg’s whig view of history is at play here, wherein any traditional British institution is by definition great and wonderful and marks our innate superiority over those horrible modernists and Napoleonists on the Continent. If that means unwashed rabble occasionally get away with toppling the statue of some oik who earned his money through trade, then quel dommage.
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There’s a charitable school in Liverpool which trained orphans to work in the slave trade–did Colston’s schools have a similar link?
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There are a couple of important differences between the English/Welsh jury system (juries work differently in Scotland, and I think in Northern Ireland, which have their own legal systems) and those in the US:
-Voir dire and jury challenges essentially don’t exist. The first 12 jurors chosen at random from the pool are the ones who will try the case, unless one of them knows somebody involved in it.
-Unanimous verdicts aren’t required. They are at first, but if the jury takes a long time to reach a verdict then the judge can say that an 11-1 or 10-2 majority is acceptable.
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15 members, can convict on an 8-7 split, no hung juries (failure to reach a verdict is equivalent to a verdict of not guilty).
Also, three verdicts are available — the usual two plus “not proven” (often interpreted as “we think the accused did it, but the prosecution didn’t prove it”).
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Well. A jury also let Kyle Rittenhouse go. Hard to see that happening under civil law.
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in the states, allowing split jurys is considered a legacy of jim crow because it let majority white jurys ignore the input of non-white members
the supreme court ruled it illegal just a bit ago
any idea about the context for them over the pond?
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In Northern Ireland criminal cases can be heard without a jury, the stated purpose being to avoid intimidation of jurors by paramilitaries.
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I suspect the tories are particularly annoyed by this because the only reason the case went to court at all was because the Home Secretary effectively ordered that someone had to be arrested. Avon and Somerset police had already made the (imo correct) decision on the day that it was better to stand back and allow a statue to be damaged, than try to wade in which might have kicked off a riot.
Compare and contrast to when they came in mob-handed to deal with the ‘Kill the Bill’ protests, which swiftly became violent.
Still, at least I can feel proud of my city for this verdict.
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There’s a charitable school in Liverpool which trained orphans to work in the slave trade–did Colston’s schools have a similar link?
No, but the first school Colston approached to donate to refused a bequest because he insisted only the children of Church of England parents could benefit from it. He started his own schools so he could effect his sectarian agenda.
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In England, they were brought in in the 1960s. The reason given was to make jury tampering more difficult, after some high-profile acquittals in organised crime cases- it is harder to bribe or threaten 3 jurors than one.
In Scotland, it’s the way it has always been (since medieval times). The relatively recent (18th century) innovation there is the ability of a jury to find a defendant not guilty, rather than simply decide whether the prosecution’s case was proven or not proven.
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Almost as if juries are capable of making bad calls as well as good ones.
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In AMERICA?!? A jury letting a white guy off for shooting some rioters who support anti-America movements like BLM!!! NeVEr!!! /s
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