I have been selected for Jury Duty 3 times and the last case was a girl that wanted a jury trial. On a sunny Sunday afternoon she ran into a farmers (around 68 years old) tree that fell across the road. The local road crew had weekends off and the farmer saw the tree on his way home from church. He grabbed his chain saw and was about ready to head out to cut the tree when a girl ran into it totaling her car and requiring many trips to her Doctor. It came down to the farmer was guilty of not blocking the road BUT the girl admitted the sun was in her eyes preventing her from seeing the tree across the road. We were instructed that one or the other had to be found 100% at fault which we couldn't do. If you can't see you can't or shouldn't be driving so she lost her case.
Most of the "jury instructions" are just made up stuff to force the jury to come up with an answer.
The judge can tell you all he want that you must judge the case on the facts and you can't judge the law and all the rest, but you don't have to violate your conscience.
Sat on a 6 man jury on a 12 count sexual crime case. It was a couple that got married and blended a family. The woman had a daughter and the man had a son. They were married about 5 years and split the sheets.
Then they found out the boy was having some time with his "step sister" where they had kissed and groped each other. They were both 16.
The mom went berserk and sued her one time step son.
The deputy DA went wild when we came back with a not guilty, even though by the judges own words the kid was guilty.
Not one of us thought it was ok to hang a sex crime charge on a boy who had actually done nothing wrong.
Eventually the deputy DA made it to DA. He was a real piece of work.
