• Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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    16 hours ago

    In my opinion you should look at the law objectively, a group of people who aren’t fully educated on the law and aren’t trained in being objective will not form an objective opinion.

    Juries would be fine to give advice to the judge on how the public sees it, but they shouldn’t have a real impact on the outcome of the situation. That should be a question of executing the law.

    We have no trial by jury in The Netherlands and the international court of law doesn’t have a jury either. The just have 15 judges to decide the outcome.

    • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      6 hours ago

      Yeah… As someone who has been on a jury, I have to disagree completely. Putting people’s lives into the hands of one (most likely old, straight, white dude in the case of the US) single person is an awful idea. The concept of a trial by a jury of your peers is far from perfect, but it works relatively well.

      For an example a single judge being responsible for ruining the lives of thousands of children as a result of outright quid pro quo, look into “cash for kids” scandal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal

      • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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        2 hours ago

        Who say it has to be one man, it doesn’t have to be one person.

        But as somebody who has studied a couple laws (tax laws, some general laws etc) I can tell you that there is so much going on that somebody who hasn´t studied about it shouldn´t have an impactfull stay in it.

        In the article you linked had this in the second sentance:

        In 2008, judges Michael Conahan and Mark Ciavarella were convicted of accepting money in return for imposing harsh adjudications on juveniles to increase occupancy at a private prison operated by PA Child Care.[2]

        Yes, if corruption is rampant in your country than no it doesn’t work, but that also means a jury can be bought. Probably harder though, so I guess you have a point. I know the US is a corrupt nation, but I always think of it not being a corrupt country. The absurd legal fees, getting paid for more than the actual damages among other things don´t really help to get a second opinion in terms of a lawsuit which everybody in at least the western world has a right to as far as I know.

        In NL we do often have cases with only 1 judge, but for important cases we will have 3 judges.