Truthful Jurors Are Imperative To Justice

I was reading some websites that a fellow lawyer had passed on to me concerning jury nullification. Basically, they argue that they only need to follow the law if there isn’t an injustice involved. Their examples do make some sense, although they suffer from an issue of what is their law?

Now, if in voir dire they identify the differences they have with the law that will be used then they are being consistent with the oath they take to tell the truth. Even if they don’t have their own law, they should let us know what they have trouble with. They are going to be potential umpires, we need to know their strike zone.

What is troubling is the talk of lying to get on the jury so that they can "fix things". So they raise their hands and take an oath, just like all the witnesses, and who i would think they would be outraged against if they lied. But, here they lie in answering questions. Maybe, they satisfy their conscience with some crap that they can lie to a lawyer as a professional courtesy. Maybe it is some belief that you can lie because of a goal of a greater good. Sorry, it still is a lie.

It’s odd to be questioning a juror and know that they aren’t telling the truth. I’ve had occasions were a life long school rival of one of my witnesses claimed that she had no idea who the person was ( they had been in a fight at a bar three weeks earlier) and another occasion where an insurance adjuster told me he had no feelings one way or the other about a certain type of medical care. I thought then and still do now that these were people willing to do what it took to make mischief on a jury.

The system requires truth and openness to obtain legitimate results. I believe that most jurors work really hard and strive for justice. Hopefully, the few who work to pervert the system won’t be successful.