Re: [IP] more on keep them ignorant -- ElcomSoft Jury Asks for Law Text - judge refuses

[Steve Schear]

In cases where the statues might appear to reasonable people, otherwise ignorant of the judicial process, to be made from whole cloth or contrary to "fairness" or a "plain reading of the constitution," denying juries access can help thwart nullification. Its un-American and downright anarchistic ;-)

At 09:05 PM 12/14/2002 -0500, Steve Barber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

In jury trials in the US legal system, the jury's job is to find facts
and the judge's is to interpret the law. The judge interprets the law
relevant to the case, and transmits that interpretation to the jury in
the form of the judge's charge. The jury then takes the charge and
finds facts (by weighing the credibility of the evidence presented at
trial) according to the legal framework the charge provides.

For the jury to have access to the text of the statute is effectively
to bypass the judge's charge. The charge not only focuses the jury on
the parts of the statute relevant to the issues actually presented in
the case, but also often contains wording somewhat different from the
statute that incorporates controlling judicial precedent relevant to
and not present in the actual language of the statute.

steve