The Chauvin jurors deserve better than partisan armchair assessments of their decision

[Nevilledog]

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Philip Bump
@pbump
I think jury service is one of the most patriotic things you can do. I think bragging about avoiding service is embarrassing and immature.

And I think efforts to impugn a jury because you don't like or understand its decision is gross.

Analysis | The Chauvin jurors deserve better than partisan armchair assessments of their decision
Twelve Minnesotans gave up several weeks to evaluate a critical question under the national spotlight. That's citizenship.
washingtonpost.com
8:52 AM · Apr 21, 2021

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/04/21/chauvin-jurors-deserve-better-than-partisan-armchair-assessments-their-decision/

The jury that convicted former police officer Derek Chauvin on murder and manslaughter charges on Tuesday looked the way we expect juries to look. It was a cross-section of the Minneapolis community in which Chauvin worked and in which his victim, George Floyd, died. Each was summoned for jury duty and responded. None took the easy way out, deploying the hackneyed I’m-too-important-for-jury-duty efforts to be disqualified or sent back home. Each swore an oath: “without respect of persons or favor of any person, you will well and truly try, and true deliverance make, between the state of Minnesota and the defendant, according to law and the evidence given you in court.”

In the end, they all agreed, every one of them: Chauvin broke the law. After the verdicts were read aloud, all 12 were asked by the judge to affirm that they agreed with the verdicts. Each did.

“Juror number 55, are these your true and correct verdicts?” the judge asked. “Yes,” replied the White woman whose hobby is riding motorcycles.

“Juror number 79, are these your true and correct verdicts?” the judge asked. “Yes,” replied a Black immigrant who has lived in the area for 20 years.

“Juror number 85, are these your true and correct verdicts?” the judge asked. “Yes,” replied the multiracial woman who described herself as a “working mom and wife.”

“Are these your verdicts, so say you one, so say you all?” the judge asked. “Yes,” all of the jurors replied.

*snip*

[Hoyt]

1. Other than Tucker Carlson and a few like him, I'm not hearing much criticism from GOPers.

I think very few GOPers support Chauvin.

[MichMan]

2. I bet that if they had voted not to convict they would have been shredded to pieces here

[Nevilledog]

3. And rightly so as their verdict would have ignored the mountain of evidence presented.

[USALiberal]

5. Yep! We are at times biased as any group! Nt

[MarcA]

4. Juries and Jurors are the Lightning Rods for the Legal System n/t

[Treefrog]

6. K and r.

[gratuitous]

7. The short answer, win or lose

The short answer to jury criticism is that the jurors were there for the entire trial. Their critics rarely were in the courtroom for the entire trial. I had the honor to work on a civil lawsuit that won a judgment against Philip Morris, and the uninformed criticism that followed on was as risible as it was ignorant. "Gee, yeah, why didn't Philip Morris hire good attorneys who would have thought of your half-assed argument for why they shouldn't have lost?" (Philip Morris had the best attorneys money could buy; they still lost.)