It is also important during a trial to have some back-up Jurors, in case there is a situation where a juror is unfit to continue their role in the case, for example they are proven to have bias.
The Jurors will listen to both the prosecution and the defence, and once all evidence has been presented to them, discuss whether they believe the defendant to be guilty or not guilty. This is decided by a majority vote, should not all Jurors agree.
The OJ Simpson Case
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| An illustration of the OJ Simpson Jury |
The Jury in the OJ Simpson was manipulated by both the Prosecution and the Defence, to serve their purpose. The defence believed that black people would be more likely to support OJ's innocents, and that Black women would have misgivings with the victim. This could arguably be one of the main reasons for OJ being found not guilty, due to the huge race element surrounding the case. When it was revealed that some of the jurors had some legal reasons for not able to pass un-bias judgement, both sides began attempting to get jurors removed in order to have a jury which suited their argument.
The OJ Simpson case ran on for 8 months, and due to the high profile nature of the case the Jurors could not be allowed access to information about the case that was not being presented in the court room, for example all of the details concerning Mark Fuhrman. As a result of this,the Jurors were kept in a hotel, and were not allowed any access to the outside world, which in turn caused the Jurors to become angry at points.