Let's Demand Minimum of 50% Black Juries for Black Defendants

[Depreciating Asset]

The Sixth Amendment of the Constitution entitles each citizen to a fair trial by an 'impartial jury'. Numerous studies have demonstrated that juries (and judges) discriminate on the basis of race.

(http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPa...handle=hein.journals/saclr35&div=20&id=&page=

http://qje.oxfordjournals.org/content/127/2/1017.short ...)

Blacks are convicted more often by all white juries than juries with at least one black member. Thus these racially biased juries are not impartial.

It's no news that black incarceration is crippling our communities. Let's make sure that the thousands of black men on trial get a more fair trial.

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EDIT:

Let's say you were innocent but were being accused of committing a crime in China.

The Chinese police have and arrested you and charged you.

The prosecution brings in a witness who claims that they saw you commit the crime. It's your word against his (hers)

The all-Chinese jury looks at you and then looks at the witness. Without even knowing the details of the case, its human nature that the Chinese jury is going to be a little more sympathetic to one of their own. They also are more likely to believe that the Chinese cops who brought you in got it right.

You are more likely to be found guilty than if the case happened in your own country.

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This is the condition we still face. In courts were are somewhat like foreigners on trial in a foreign land. We are perceived as a threat since we don't look like them, we are under greater scrutiny.

Someone call Farrakhan, Sharpton and Obama. Let's get this done.

 

[DEAD7]

We are too small a part of the population, and too high a part of the court system for that to work I believe...

Would be nice tho.

 

[Kritic]

We

 

[newarkhiphop]

What if the black juries start convicting blacks

 

[Depreciating Asset]

What if the black juries start convicting blacks

Odds are then those blacks are more likely to be guilty.

The point is not to help guilty blacks get off for crimes that they did not commit. The point is just to have black defendants found guilty and receive prison sentences just as often and as long as their white counterparts.

It's clear from the evidence that white juries are less sympathetic to black defendants. At least with a jury of 50% blacks, black jurors would hopefully have the right amount of empathy for black defendants and black character witnesses.

 

[Depreciating Asset]

We are too small a part of the population, and too high a part of the court system for that to work I believe...

Would be nice tho.

I think of it as a legal form of affirmative action. Affirmative action at least attempted to compensate for a system of discrimination in business.

Where is the affirmative action in the legal system?

Clearly blacks have been disproportionately disenfranchised by the US justice system since its inception. The term 'New Jim Crow' is no accident. Jim Crow laws were abolished in the South in the visible public domain. But somehow America's courts were exempt.

 

[cleanface coney]

they would still find a way to pull some bullshyt on us

 

[bzb]

this is a decent idea. however i would prefer we take the energy needed to change the court system and focus it on keeping our people out of the court system to begin with. politicians can't and won't do this for us. the main thing that will improve our community is when more of us black men focus on being leaders and examples to our families and each other.

once you're in the system it's a much harder road from there since your options in life are drastically reduced.

we got to treat the cause not the illness.

 

[Depreciating Asset]

this is a decent idea. however i would prefer we take the energy needed to change the court system and focus it on keeping our people out of the court system to begin with. politicians can't and won't do this for us. the main thing that will improve our community is when more of us black men focus on being leaders and examples to our families and each other.

once you're in the system it's a much harder road from there since your options in life are drastically reduced.

we got to treat the cause not the illness.

Good points indeed. But we don't have to wage only one battle at a time. We have enough troops to wage battles on several fronts.

Hundreds of thousands of fathers and potential husbands are lost to the prison system each decade.
Prison records limit the employment and wage earning options of many potentially resourceful black men.
People with felony records can't vote in many (most?) states.

So this problem has a cyclical effect on the other problems. Getting fairer trials leaves more potential leaders, fathers and workers in the community rather than prison.

 

[Kritic]

What if the black juries start convicting blacks

that can't happen. look at a case like the trayvon case. the only "black" jury was half black-half hispanic and she had zimmerman guilty. the crackas in the juries had her hands tied.. it's only until the got from being around those devils and got back to her senses she said she regretted it.

 

[Blackking]

lol, black male juries.... cuz......

 

[Domingo Halliburton]

where's the petition?

 

[NZA]

if there was a requirement for this, the arrest rate would drop because bullshyt cases would no longer be as easy to win. many of these cases are plead down before court because public defenders judge the risk and reward ratio, reward would go up with a true jury of your peers

 

[Hiphoplives4eva]

This is actually an excellent idea. Would never be allowed though in this country.

 

[Golayitdown]

Damn good idea. Can't see this ever happening in this day and age though.