NCJ Number
162946
Journal
Criminal Law Bulletin Volume: 32 Issue: 2 Dated: (March-April 1996) Pages: 134-180
Date Published
1996
Length
47 pages
Annotation
Issues regarding the composition and functioning of juries in cases involving capital punishment are reviewed; these issues include death-qualification; the use of individualized, sequestered voir dire for jury selection; peremptory challenges; hung juries that are unable to reach unanimous agreement about sentencing verdicts; and the administration of jury instructions.
Abstract
The jury has its most uniquely important role in deciding guilt and punishment in capital prosecutions. The jury is also the institution best suited for making the fundamentally moral judgments that death penalty laws require. However, preliminary research results raise serious questions about whether jurors in capital trials actually understand and apply capital punishment law as written by legislatures and interpreted by the courts. Statutory reforms that should be considered include the significant curtailment of the death-qualification of capital jurors; the use of individualized, sequestered voir dire in jury selection in capital trials; a limit on the number of peremptory challenges in these trials; elimination of Allen charges at penalty-phase hearings in jurisdictions in which the jury's failure to vote unanimously for death results in the imposition of a prison sentence; and efforts to make jury instructions as understandable as possible. Footnotes