![]() If a juror’s belief is that a guilty verdict would be unjust, it is important for them not to cave in to the majority view for the sake of consensus, even though they may experience psychological discomfort in standing alone or in the minority. Even when a defendant is able to appeal a conviction, that individual no longer enjoys the presumption of innocence. It may not be legally permitted, the defendant may no longer have the financial resources to mount an appeal, etc. An appeal is not guaranteed in the first place. However, many people colloquially use the term jury nullification to encompass this type of scenario.įunctionally, a hung jury is far better for the defendant than a conviction. A judge may decide to disallow this in some cases, but the prosecutor is usually allowed to proceed.īecause the case can be retried, a hung jury caused by one or more conscientious objectors to the law who voted not guilty even though they believed the law was broken does not constitute jury nullification in the strictest sense of the term. The law can be said to be nullified in the trial at hand, but it is not nullified in the case altogether. If a mistrial occurs due to a hung jury, the prosecutor may decide to retry the case. Nonetheless, in the United States today, it is generally permitted. It is questionable whether or not retrial after a hung jury is Constitutional. Findlater, Retrial after a Hung Jury: The Double Jeopardy Problem, 129 U. Although recently acknowledging the likely inaccuracy of that view, the Court treated the matter as one “of academic interest only.” In so doing, it simply compounded error. The Court, however, has repeatedly read Perez as if it had established the standard for resolving the extent of the defendant’s double jeopardy protection following a mistrial. In doing so, it created an issue that did not obtain when Perez was decided: the effect of the double jeopardy clause on the retrial of cases that abort before verdict. ![]() Since Perez, however, the Supreme Court has held that jeopardy attaches before a verdict is rendered-specifically when the jury is impaneled and sworn. At that time, the Court adhered to the English common law view that jeopardy does not attach until a verdict is rendered.īut that is no longer the Court’s view. In 1824, the hung jury question did not implicate the double jeopardy clause of the fifth amendment. This failure to refer to the Constitution was not inadvertent. However, this ruling was not made on Constitutional grounds.Īccording to law professor Janet Findlater,Īlthough the question in Perez was indeed whether a defendant could be retried following a hung jury, nowhere in the unanimous opinion authored by Justice Story, is either double jeopardy or the fifth amendment mentioned. Perez, Supreme Court precedent has held that retrial in the event of a mistrial is permissible. When there is a mistrial, however, the case may be retried. ![]() An acquittal results from a not guilty verdict and cannot be appealed by the prosecution, overturned by the judge, or retried. In the event of a mistrial, the defendant is not convicted, but neither is the defendant acquitted. (Mistrials can happen for other reasons, so when a trial ends in a mistrial, it is not necessarily due to a hung jury.) If a verdict still cannot be delivered, at some point the judge will declare a mistrial due to the hung jury. This direction is most commonly known as an Allen charge. ![]() The judge may direct them to deliberate further, usually no more than once or twice. When there are insufficient jurors voting one way or the other to deliver either a guilty or not guilty verdict, the jury is known as a “hung jury” or it might be said that jurors are “deadlocked”. ![]()
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