Hard News: Behaving badly at the bottom of town
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Steve Parks, in reply to
You are a perfect example of how broken the “random” selection is, though. I know many people who’ve never been summonsed,
I'm one of those, and I'd happily do jury service. Last ten years in Wellington, no call up. In that same time, my ex was called for trials almost immediately after the 2-year reprieve. 3 or 4 times, I think. And we have concerns that it difficult to get jurors, with too many people opting out with excuses. There is something wrong with their system, for sure.
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I've *never* been called for jury service...maybe it's because I live in a remote area (but there are jury trials in Greymouth.) Maybe it's because I'm an ex-law student.
Maybe it's just the luck of the draw... -
I was called up at university, but it was a week that I either had a load of exams or a thesis due (I forget), but either way, it was a straight forward process to withdraw from the process weeks before.
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Is there a limited number of challenges for each side
I believe it’s six per side, but whatever it is can be varied by the judge with the agreement of counsel – as is the case with the majority of the rules that apply to running a trial.
It changed reasonably recently. It's now four per defendant per side without cause (but the prosecution never gets more than eight). And I'm pretty sure it can't be varied.
There are also an unlimited number of challenges for cause, but these are rare (they could be used for things like "the defendant was at high school with this guy" or "we are aware that this person is the partner of a mongrel mob member, and the victim was a mongrel mob member").
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I’ve *never* been called for jury service…maybe it’s because I live in a remote area (but there are jury trials in Greymouth.)
As at the middle of 2009 (for when I have the stats) 53% of New Zealanders 18+ resided outside High Court jury districts, and 23% outside District Court jury districts.
These numbers will be somewhat lower now (the distance was increased from 30km to 45km in the same legislation that lowered the number of challenges and brought in majority verdicts etc. ) - somewhere around 49% and 17%.
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Thanks Graeme! My exclusuion from jury service now makes perfect sense.
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Since moving to Japan I’ve been called up for jury service three times. For some reason, nobody ever notices anything odd about the postal address. (I’d be perfectly happy to serve if they paid the airfare!)
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Matt McCarten on the Urewera trial.
The special terrorism task force co-ordinated the round-up and breathlessly informed us that they had smashed a home-grown terror plot by hardened Maori radicals, diehard communists, revolutionary anarchists and wild environmental activists. Anyone who knows anything about politics knows any such combination is the opposite of the tightly-wedded force necessary for a terrorist cell. They don't even believe in the same things.
...
The Urewera defendants are unlucky because their case has too many careers and reputations in the state bureaucracy riding on them being convicted and jailed to get a fair trial. I'm not saying the people arrested for attending a camp, where perhaps firearms were involved, haven't broken certain laws. But I'm sure the whole silliness could have been fixed at the start with the iwi liaison cops in the area being sent up to Tame to pick up any weapons and give him a kick up the backside.
But vested interests need to embellish the threat for their own reasons. It gives an excuse to introduce laws so the state can spy even more on its citizens, increase funding and powers for our paramilitary police and deny legal defence rights for anyone charged under these new laws. In the past four years this is exactly what's happened. If I was a conspiracy theorist I'd think the whole thing was a set-up. At the very least the state has milked the situation for all it's worth.
The last thing the establishment wants is a jury trial where ordinary citizens see this nonsense for what it is and laugh it out of court.
That's the real crime.
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Yamis, in reply to
I got called up when I was in Korea, though they mailed it to my NZ address and I found out from mummy. Been called up at least twice more in the past 5 years but it's been at times in the school term when there's been NCEA assessment on and if the poor wee buggars have a relief teacher floundering through a topic they know nothing about and assessment (not really allowed anyway) then goodbye credits. So was let off it each time. I'm quite keen to do it but not when others are going to suffer while I satisfy my curiosity and other public service.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
The last thing the establishment wants is a jury trial where ordinary citizens see this nonsense for what it is and laugh it out of court.
That's actually a pretty nasty veiled slur on the judiciary, to be quite frank. Casting aspersions on senior cops and prosecutors is one thing, and probably merited to some degree, but the implication that a judge will come to a conclusion that is supported only by a vast conspiracy of the upper echelons of the establishment is going too far.
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My university pretty much tells you that you have to do you duty (obligations to lectures, exams etc are not a valid excuse), and then they demand you hand over the daily fee.. Bastards!
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
. . . the implication that a judge will come to a conclusion that is supported only by a vast conspiracy of the upper echelons of the establishment is going too far.
Too far for what, genteel sensibilities? The Peter Ellis saga proves that justice in NZ can all too easily become an exercise in arse-covering. The inflammatory term "vast conspiracy" could just as easily be interpreted as a slur on the jury system. I'd have thought that was every bit as important to our legal system as the integrity of the judiciary.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
Peter Ellis was convicted by a jury who got bamboozled by what's looking more and more like a metric butt-load of bullshit. Were they part of a conspiracy too?
Judges are supposed to be somewhat harder to baffle than juries. They have the time to examine the intricacies of scientific evidence, and are meant to be less hesitant at calling out expert witnesses. There's a reason behind the saying "If you're guilty, go with a jury. If you're innocent, go with a judge."
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giovanni tiso, in reply to
the implication that a judge will come to a conclusion that is supported only by a vast conspiracy of the upper echelons of the establishment is going too far
I swear New Zealanders are fucking adorable. How do you get off living in a country where such presumptions aren't the norm, backed up by reams upon reams of historical precedent?
I'd observe that suppressing the case for why the defendants are not getting a jury trial is troubling, and that putting pressure on one judge ought to be easier than on twelve citizens - but maybe you're right and it's just not how it works.
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I’d observe that suppressing the case for why the defendants are not getting a jury trial is troubling
The suppression of the reasons for the decision is at the request of the defendants.
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When did that transpire?
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I've been called up for jury duty 3 times, of which I actually served once. That particular time, we, the jury, threw out an assault case because we all concluded that the plaintiff pressed charges out of spite.
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Sacha, in reply to
The suppression of the reasons for the decision is at the request of the defendants.
Are we allowed to know/say that?
Without having seen the suppressed material, I guess this fact might suggest that there is some reasoning in the decision that could affect the reputation of the defendants?
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How do you get off living in a country where such presumptions aren't the norm, backed up by reams upon reams of historical precedent?
We don't have reams of historical precedent for anything here.
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When did that transpire?
Throughout. I don't have the facts on hand to responsibly assert that all of the suppression has been at defence request, but I know of no suppressions in this case that have been imposed in the face of defence opposition.
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recordari, in reply to
Anyone else watch Sleeping Dogs on Maori Televison last night?
Found myself laughing ironically at how completely implausible it all was. Especially now our Skyhawks are in mothballs. Can you even imagine an air strike on a bivouac in one of our national parks?
We don't have reams of historical precedent for anything here.
So we keep borrowing everyone else's, or getting Weta Workshop to digitally enhance the one's we've got.
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giovanni tiso, in reply to
I don't have the facts on hand to responsibly assert that all of the suppression has been at defence request
Isn't that exactly what you asserted about fifteen centimetres above? (Although yes, that does change the complexion of things)
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Sacha, in reply to
I know of no suppressions in this case that have been imposed in the face of defence opposition.
But the whole suppression process has been.. suppressed, hasn't it - except two clauses.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
How do you get off living in a country where such presumptions aren’t the norm, backed up by reams upon reams of historical precedent?
Because we don't have a history of a corrupt judiciary. Or of a corrupt anything much, for that matter. We just don't. Have you missed the year-after-year results of the "Least-Corrupt Countries Index" or whatever it's called, where NZ consistently rates in the top 3?
Our judiciary is not perfect, and I don't think they're saints, but if they're really government stooges in disguise they do a masterful job of projecting an image of staunch independence. Perhaps you missed the Chief Justice being told to keep her opinions on crime and punishment to herself? And the repeated statements by the senior District Court judge on the same topic?
You may come from a country where public officials are available to the highest bidder, and thus ought best be treated with appropriate degrees of scepticism, but NZ is not Italy. We make a big deal out of a judge not recusing himself because he had business relations with a lawyer appearing before him. That, and fiddling expenses, are as close as we get to true judicial scandal. -
Isn’t that exactly what you asserted about fifteen centimetres above? (Although yes, that does change the complexion of things)
No. I said earlier that the suppression of the reasons for the decision *about the jury trial* was at the request of the defence.
I said later that I believed that probably all of the suppression of everything else in the case - e.g. suppression around the bail hearings, suppression around evidence rulings, etc. was at defence request/with defence agreement.
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