Juries Qualifications

Subdecks (1)

Cards (28)

  • Juries help to decide the verdict in the Crown Court. However, they only hear about 1-2% of criminal cases as the majority of cases involve a guilty plea, eliminating the need for a jury.
  • A Crown Court jury has 12 members.
  • The list of jurors can be seen by the prosecution and defence. On some occasions, potential jurors should be vetted via police checks or wider background checks.
  • Vetting should also be used in exceptional cases involving national security or terrorism.
  • s5 Juries Act 1974 means that a whole jury can be challenged on the belief they are unrepresentative or biased. This is "to the array".
  • You can also challenge for cause, meaning that you challenge the right of an individual juror to sit on the jury.
  • The qualifications for a jury is set out in Juries Act 1974:
    • Between 18 and 75
    • Registered as a voter
    • Ordinarily a resident in the UK for 5 years.
  • People are permanently disqualified from jury service if they have been sentences to:
    • Imprisonment for life
    • Detention under His Majesty's pleasure
    • Imprisonment/Detention for public protection
    • A term of imprisonment/detention for a term of five years or more.
  • They can also be disqualified for 10 years if:
    • At any time they have served a sentence of imprisonment
    • Had a suspended sentence passed on them
    • At any time had a community sentence.
  • Anyone currently on bail is also disqualified.
  • A judges may discharge a person for lack of capacity if they:
    • Suffer from a mental illness resulting in attending hospital
    • Not understanding English adequately
    • Having a disability which makes them unable like blindness.
  • Since 2022, a deaf juror way now sit with a BSL interpreter if the judge deem this appropriate.
  • Blind people cannot go into jury service because it means they can't see any potential evidence needed.
  • Court may also grant excusal if there is a good reason like:
    • Illness
    • Being a mother with a small baby
    • Upcoming examinations
    The jury service will then also be deferred to a later date.
  • Names for jury members are selected at random by a computer from the electoral register for that area.
  • Jurors are divided into groups of 15 and allocated to a courtroom. The clerk will then select 12 at random. At this point, both prosecution and defence will have certain rights to challenge one or more of the jurors.
  • Juries are used in around 30,000 cases a year and they decide the guilty or not guilty verdict.
  • They use a private room to discuss the case facts and they must come to a unanimous decision, which must then be accepted by the judge.
  • If, after two hours, the jury have not reached a unanimous verdict, the judge can direct the jury to a majority verdict. This has been allowed since 1967 and about 20% of jury convictions are majority verdict.