HAMLYN - College of Social Sciences and International Studies ...

Criminal Justice
foundation of our system. It is drawn at random from the lawabiding
inhabitants of the locality in which a case is tried. We must
on no account introduce measures which allow the state to start
nibbling away at the principle of random selection of jurors".
Jurors must not be seen, he said, as "representing the views of
the community, or of discrete parts of it, nor indeed of representing
either the complainant or the victim". 39 On reflection, I
think that on this issue Lord Taylor was right and the Royal
Commission wrong.
I have always been a strong supporter of the jury system as
incomparably the best known way of dealing with serious cases.
Sometimes, admittedly, the jury gives a truly perverse verdict—
one not only contrary to the evidence and the law but which is
inexplicable even in terms of what is sometimes called jury
equity. However, such cases seem to be very rare. Research
suggests that generally the jury's verdict is explicable in light of
the evidence, 40 and when it is not it usually seems to represent
the jury reaction to what it considers to be an unjust law, an
unfair prosecution or the threat of an excessive penalty. The
jury's capacity to do justice in defiance of the law, as in the case
of Clive Pontdng, has been part of its historic role over the
centuries 41 and we would be poorer without it.
There is as yet no right of appeal by the prosecution against a
jury acquittal save in the rare situation where it can be established
that the acquittal was probably the result of intimidation
or other form of jury nobbling for which someone has been
convicted. 42 Recently, however, the Law Commission has proposed,
in the aftermath of the Stephen Lawrence case, that in
certain circumstances a second trial should be allowed. The
offence would have to be punishable with three or more years
of imprisonment; the new evidence would have to strengthen
39 The Times, July 1, 1995.
40 See J. Vennard, "The Outcome of Contested Trials" in Managing Criminal
Justice (D. Moxon ed., 1985), pp. 126-151; and "Evidence and Outcome: A
Comparison of Contested Trials in Magistrates' Courts and the Crown Court",
Home Office Research and Planning Unit, Research Bulletin (No. 20, 1986),
p. 48.
41 For research that traces that role see T.A. Green, Verdict According to
Conscience: Perspectives on the English Criminal Trial, 1200-1800 (Chicago
University Press, 1985).
42 This exception was introduced by the Criminal Procedure and Investigations
Act 1996, s. 54.
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