Dear Editor,
Anyone who is selected to sit on a jury in a criminal case should understand what the sixth amendment is really about. This amendment describes our rights to a jury trial after we have been charged with a crime by the government. There are two words in that amendment that are key to understanding your function as a juror.
The first word is the word “accused.” The person charged with a crime is referred to as the accused and is not described as the defendant. In all criminal cases I know of, the prosecutors call the accused a defendant. By using that description of the accused it is obvious to me that the prosecutor is trying to establish at least in the jury’s mind that the accused in some way has a duty to defend himself against the charges against him. By being called a defendant he is somewhat akin to a person in a sports match up, he is expected to have to defend himself. In some ways the prosecutor is trying to erase in the jury’s mind the presumption of innocence.
The other key word in the sixth amendment is the only adjective that describes the jury and that word is “impartial.” To be truly impartial the jury cannot favor the accused or the government.That is why friends and family members of the accused are not permitted to sit on a criminal jury. In virtually all criminal trials the judge will tell the jury that they must follow the law which the accused was charged with violating! To me this is another way of saying that the jury must be partial to the government. Obviously the source of the law is the government. By following the law as written by the government you can only come to the conclusion that the jury is being partial to the government. I can assure you that none of our founders would agree that a jury should be partial to the government in this way!
Dr. W. David
Herbert ESQ
Billings
