Extinction Rebellion: Jury acquits protesters despite judge's direction

[Gray2233]

One is ignoring science/facts and putting foward ways/rules that endanger other peoples lifes, the other is someones own nonsense.

She's a teacher, as such she's in a position of influence and authority over her students. The other young man on the call obviously agreed with much of what she was saying, I imagine she'll have other impressionable students who will also fall into that trap. What happens when one of them is facing a dangerous, or even life threatening situation were they to take her advice?

Someone else mentioned that she might have been fired, I sincerely hope that she has but unfortunately she's far from the only educator with such loony views.

 

[Jean-F]

On the contrary, the Jury have done exactly what Trial by Jury is supposed to do. The whole point of Jury Trials is to moderate the legal system with the judgement of the people; if you don't want that, you don't want Jury trials. Just have cases tried by a panel of judges as happens across most of the continent.



No, they've been let down by the system. The Jury did their job.

Oh I see now where I was going wrong, in my ignorance I saw the job of a jury as listening to the evidence presented by the prosecution, and also any counter of that evidence by the defence.
Then to make their conclusions on that evidence, and to decide, hopefully unanimously, on whether the defendant(s) is/are guilty or not guilty.
Not to be told that what the defendant(s) did was irrefutably illegal and has no defence in law, but then to feel sympathetic toward them and find them not guilty.

 

[Mr Jack]

Oh I see now where I was going wrong, in my ignorance I saw the job of a jury as listening to the evidence presented by the prosecution, and also any counter of that evidence by the defence.
Then to make their conclusions on that evidence, and to decide, hopefully unanimously, on whether the defendant(s) is/are guilty or not guilty.
Not to be told that what the defendant(s) did was irrefutably illegal and has no defence in law, but then to feel sympathetic toward them and find them not guilty.

If all you want is an assessment of the evidence in front of the court why, on Earth, would you get a bunch of untrained members of the public to do it? The many, many failings of the Jury system at assessing evidence in an effective and unbiased fashion are well known.

The merit of the system is that the Jury is that there is more to do than assess the evidence. They're also there to act as the conscience of the system.

 

[Jean-F]

If all you want is an assessment of the evidence in front of the court why, on Earth, would you get a bunch of untrained members of the public to do it? The many, many failings of the Jury system at assessing evidence in an effective and unbiased fashion are well known.

The merit of the system is that the Jury is there to do more than assess the evidence. They're also there to act as the conscience of the system.

Guten Nachmittag, Herr Jack,
It’s not a case of me just wanting an assessment of the evidence decided on by “a bunch of untrained members of the public”, it’s the fact that that is the law as I understand it, and I don’t subscribe to the suggestion that a jury is there to act as the conscience of the system.
Trial by jury was introduced in its more or less modern form in U.K. by Henry 11 in the twelfth century, initially for resolving land disputes, and until an Act of Parliament changes it, it’s good enough for me.

 

[Mr Jack]

Guten Nachmittag, Herr Jack

In Nordfriesland, the correct greeting is "Moin" regardless of the time of day, as it is in most of the North of Germany, although "Moin Moin" is favoured in some areas.

It’s not a case of me just wanting an assessment of the evidence decided on by “a bunch of untrained members of the public”, it’s the fact that that is the law as I understand it, and I don’t subscribe to the suggestion that a jury is there to act as the conscience of the system.

Then what, exactly, is the point? Do you consider it merely an artefact of our history? What? The law, as much as it says anything, accepts the judgement of the Jury as primary. The right of a Jury to return a perverse verdict has been accepted in law at least since the late 17th century when laws that allowed the court to punish the Jury were removed.

Trial by jury was introduced in its more or less modern form in U.K. by Henry 11 in the twelfth century, initially for resolving land disputes, and until an Act of Parliament changes it, it’s good enough for me.

No, it wasn't. You can trace it's history back to there, but the idea that this ancient notion of trial by your peers is "more or less" the modern form is tosh.

 

[Jean-F]

In Nordfriesland, the correct greeting is "Moin" regardless of the time of day, as it is in most of the North of Germany, although "Moin Moin" is favoured in some areas.



Then what, exactly, is the point? Do you consider it merely an artefact of our history? What? The law, as much as it says anything, accepts the judgement of the Jury as primary. The right of a Jury to return a perverse verdict has been accepted in law at least since the late 17th century when laws that allowed the court to punish the Jury were removed.



No, it wasn't. You can trace it's history back to there, but the idea that this ancient notion of trial by your peers is "more or less" the modern form is tosh.

Sorry about the fractured German Jack, my son has lived in Bielefeld NRW for 30 odd years, and I pick up bits of the language from meine deutsche Schwiegertochter, und meine Enkel, full disclosure, I Googled “good afternoon!”
I usually confine myself to Wodka und Tonic bitte, Eis, aber keine Zitronscheibe, I hope I got that right.
Apparently I don’t know as much about jurisprudence as I thought, I’ll endeavour to read more, Tschüss, Jean-F

 

[Mr Jack]

Sorry about the fractured German Jack

I wouldn't worry about it, my German barely makes it past passable.

 

[bingham67]

I see they are back in London causing chaos for the next few weeks!

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...day-roads-remain-closed-Londons-West-End.html

 

[PlacidCasual]

Just take the details of everyone involved and revoke their mobile phone privileges and demonstration as ego boosting performance art would cease to exist.

 

[Energize]

If all you want is an assessment of the evidence in front of the court why, on Earth, would you get a bunch of untrained members of the public to do it? The many, many failings of the Jury system at assessing evidence in an effective and unbiased fashion are well known.

The merit of the system is that the Jury is that there is more to do than assess the evidence. They're also there to act as the conscience of the system.

Agreed.

In this case Shell have arguably violated the non-aggression principle by causing massive pollution. The argument that "the company was directly contributing to climate change, "thereby causing serious injury and death"" has merit.

 

[hurfdurf]

Agreed.

In this case Shell have arguably violated the non-aggression principle by causing massive pollution. The argument that "the company was directly contributing to climate change, "thereby causing serious injury and death"" has merit.

This is a very clever way of looking at things.

 

[robfosters]

There’s a woman in that article who’s a protester, but is clearly lacking support

 

[fez]

There’s a woman in that article who’s a protester, but is clearly lacking support

If you're talking about nipple mcstickers I don't think she needs any.

 

[Mr Jack]

If you're talking about nipple mcstickers I don't think she needs any.

Gosh. I wonder why the Daily Mail chose to include a close up photo of her?

 

[Nasher]

Should have bought those water cannons afterall.

 

[Richard - London]

There’s a woman in that article who’s a protester, but is clearly lacking support

I fully support her!

 

[dowie]

I see they are back in London causing chaos for the next few weeks!

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...day-roads-remain-closed-Londons-West-End.html

I guess this is why we needed more laws re: protests. The police still don't seem to be as proactive as they could be. Likewise, it seems local councils have been happy to spray areas with water to stop rough sleepers from staying but they don't seem so keen when it comes to middle-class protestors spending a night or two.

 

[Tefal]

Oh I see now where I was going wrong, in my ignorance I saw the job of a jury as listening to the evidence presented by the prosecution, and also any counter of that evidence by the defence.
Then to make their conclusions on that evidence, and to decide, hopefully unanimously, on whether the defendant(s) is/are guilty or not guilty.
Not to be told that what the defendant(s) did was irrefutably illegal and has no defence in law, but then to feel sympathetic toward them and find them not guilty.

Yep that's part of the jury system and intended function.

 

[Werewolf]

I guess this is why we needed more laws re: protests. The police still don't seem to be as proactive as they could be. Likewise, it seems local councils have been happy to spray areas with water to stop rough sleepers from staying but they don't seem so keen when it comes to middle-class protestors spending a night or two.

What sort of laws would you like to see to deal with protesters that we don't already have?

And would you like them to be written to only deal with protesters you don't like, or open so they could be used equally against protesters whose cause you do support?

It's a very fine line between freedom of speech, the right to protest and dealing with unruly protesters without making it effectively illegal for any protest.
Always remember that you might support a law because it only affects X people, or that's how it's proposed, but unless the law is carefully written (and most knee jerk ones are anything but), it's extremely easy for it to be applied to other circumstance, or to apply to people who were never intended to be it's targets*.
So when you call for tougher laws to restrict something you don't like, remember it's quite likely that it could then turn around and affect something you do like.

IIRC one the laws passed at one point made it illegal for a protest without a permit, and only allowed a handful of people to attend a protest at once in a specific area. One of the comedians who is also an activist set out to test how well that stood up as I think there had been a reassurance when the law was proposed that it wouldn't stop small, "lawful" protests. He basically submitted forms for all sorts of protests, and encouraged others to do the same so you could have a dozen different protests with the legal maximum each at the same time, in the same place to show how silly that law was.


*An example of that was the counter terrorism laws that were worded vaguely to allow the police/cps to go after suspects who were doing "reconnaissance" or had "materials supporting terrorism", with the result they started using it to try and intimidate people taking photos of historical buildings, or documenting police abuse of their powers, or the likes of theology and history students who got investigated because they had "terrorist materials" that were standard reading materials for major university courses. The wording of the that law was such that IIRC books of activities for children from the past would potentially have been an issue because back in the day you had chemistry sets and books of "fun things to do" that included making things like gunpowder (and theoretically a lot of current "advanced" physics and chemistry text books could be seen as "terrorist materials" if someone wanted to build a case).

 

[dowie]

What sort of laws would you like to see to deal with protesters that we don't already have?

And would you like them to be written to only deal with protesters you don't like, or open so they could be used equally against protesters whose cause you do support?

I'm not sure how that related to my post - note I used the word needed not need! The UK has already passed new laws to deal with protests, that's what is being referred to. So I'm not sure why there is the implicit assumption in your post that I'm calling for more?

If you want an illustration of why there was that need then just look at what happened in London not too long ago with this exact same group. The new laws came about, at least in part, as a result of that.

So when you call for tougher laws to restrict something you don't like, remember it's quite likely that it could then turn around and affect something you do like.

I haven't though, it seems like you've just not read my post correctly.