11 To 1 Majority Found Him Guilty

[chrissa1]

Graeme Jarman was found guilty yesterday by an 11 to 1 majority of murdering OAP Judith Richardson in Hexham last year.

His DNA was found on a blood stained tissue in her bedroom. An Age UK leaflet was found in her hall with his fingerprints on it. He was caught on CCTV disposing of her handbag in a bin in Newcastle. He was filmed following her to her house from Hexham town centre.

My question: What was the one person to disagree with the rest of the jury thinking?

[murraymints]

Which is WHY I am dreading jury service later this month !!!

[cathfromsaron]

some people won't support the crown on any pretext!

or they are too cowardly to have a part in his life sentence?

or they know something you don't?

[cathfromsaron]

MM: you will most likely get old ladies stealing pats of butter and the like ...

murder trials are few!

[chrissa1]

Good luck MM. I wouldn't mind Jury Service as long as it wasn't a Fraud Trial. The amount of complicated documents etc would be mind blowing.

[tonyav]

Fraud trials can go on for a very long time !

[FredPuli43]

That's the benefit of majority verdicts.Before them, and in the US still, one person could refuse to convict and there'd be a retrial. If it happened again in the retrial, the jury would be discharged and the accused would walk free, formally acquitted, since, by convention,the prosecution would offer no evidence.

If the dissenting juror thought the accused was the assailant, they must have misunderstood the judge's direction on murder. It is sufficient that the accused intended to cause grievous, that is really serious, bodily harm; it is not necessary to prove an intent to kill; and the multiple injuries from a weapon surely demonstrate that lesser intent.It could only be manslaughter if neither intent was proved.

[chrissa1]

Very interesting Fredpuli. Cheers for that.