Scottish Justice system is a joke already and they’re going to take away something that actually makes it fair.
You need a majority of 8/15 people on a Scottish jury to be found guilty. 8/15. How that doesn’t represent reasonable doubt is beyond me.
It’s a disgrace, and people should be up in arms about it. The problem is, people see themselves as more likely to be a victim of crime than someone falsely accused of a crime.
This country has spent too long wanking itself off over the idea of torturing criminals to even consider sensible reforms to the justice system.
Sounds like empty “tough on crime” bullshit. And will probably just lead to more hung juries, further increasing the backlog and cost.
I wish we had the “not proven” option in England. When I sat on a jury that’s absolutely how I would have voted (but I think I’m still not allowed to talk about the deliberation, even though this was years ago).
I lived in Hamilton at the time Amanda Duffy was murdered. She was a teenager who had gone on a night out. She was bitten, murdered and her body mutilated. The last person known to be with her that night was a young man called Francis Auld. Auld was charged with her murder, sent for trial and a Not Proven verdict was returned.
Go google for more information. It was that case which brought the Not Proven verdict back into the spotlight.
There was insufficient evidence to convict Auld. In England that would have meant a Not Guilty verdict. But there was sufficient doubt in the jury that they couldn’t declare him Not Guilty, hence them choosing Not Proven. “We know you did it, we just can’t prove it” is how people took it.
Further evidence came to light after his trial which suggested that Auld had confessed to a Prison Officer whilst on remand. Also that he had told two people that “they were next”. The Crown wanted him tried again but the new evidence was ruled inadmissible and a second trial was not permitted.
The family didn’t get satisfaction. And Auld was treated as the pariah he undoubtedly was, despite not having been found guilty.
It wasn’t the verdict itself that was at fault. But the verdict was blamed by quite reasonable people for “letting Auld get away with it”.
I’d rather the verdict remained. It officially marks someone’s card as being someone to be wary of. I’d be interested to learn if others think that’s right or wrong.
3 comments
Scottish Justice system is a joke already and they’re going to take away something that actually makes it fair.
You need a majority of 8/15 people on a Scottish jury to be found guilty. 8/15. How that doesn’t represent reasonable doubt is beyond me.
It’s a disgrace, and people should be up in arms about it. The problem is, people see themselves as more likely to be a victim of crime than someone falsely accused of a crime.
This country has spent too long wanking itself off over the idea of torturing criminals to even consider sensible reforms to the justice system.
Sounds like empty “tough on crime” bullshit. And will probably just lead to more hung juries, further increasing the backlog and cost.
I wish we had the “not proven” option in England. When I sat on a jury that’s absolutely how I would have voted (but I think I’m still not allowed to talk about the deliberation, even though this was years ago).
I lived in Hamilton at the time Amanda Duffy was murdered. She was a teenager who had gone on a night out. She was bitten, murdered and her body mutilated. The last person known to be with her that night was a young man called Francis Auld. Auld was charged with her murder, sent for trial and a Not Proven verdict was returned.
Go google for more information. It was that case which brought the Not Proven verdict back into the spotlight.
There was insufficient evidence to convict Auld. In England that would have meant a Not Guilty verdict. But there was sufficient doubt in the jury that they couldn’t declare him Not Guilty, hence them choosing Not Proven. “We know you did it, we just can’t prove it” is how people took it.
Further evidence came to light after his trial which suggested that Auld had confessed to a Prison Officer whilst on remand. Also that he had told two people that “they were next”. The Crown wanted him tried again but the new evidence was ruled inadmissible and a second trial was not permitted.
The family didn’t get satisfaction. And Auld was treated as the pariah he undoubtedly was, despite not having been found guilty.
It wasn’t the verdict itself that was at fault. But the verdict was blamed by quite reasonable people for “letting Auld get away with it”.
I’d rather the verdict remained. It officially marks someone’s card as being someone to be wary of. I’d be interested to learn if others think that’s right or wrong.