Secrets of the Jury Room

by Malcolm Knox

Lawyers and judges speak platitudes about the wisdom and commonsense and community values juries bring to bear, but it's clear from Malcolm Knox's recent experience of a long jury trial that this is a legal fiction. He found chillingly apposite an old legal you'd love to be in front of a jury if you'd committed a crime, but hate to be in front of one when you hadn't. From the extraordinary story unfolding in the courtroom, to the equally amazing account of how events unfolded in the jury room during the trial, to interviews with barristers, solicitors and other players in the criminal justice system, Malcolm investigates the tricks of the trade and sketches the vast difference between what courts think juries should be and what juries really are. The results are guaranteed to blow the mind of anyone interested in justice and how it works in Australia.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, Australia, Law

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Malcolm Knox was born in 1966. He grew up in Sydney and studied in Sydney and Scotland, where his one-act play, POLEMARCHUS, was performed in St Andrews and Edinburgh. He has worked for the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD since 1994 and his journalism has been published in Australia, Britain, India and the West Indies.

His first novel Summerland was published to great acclaim in the UK, US, Australia and Europe in 2000. In 2001 Malcolm was named one of the Sydney Morning Herald's Best Young Australian novelists. He lives in Sydney with his wife Wenona, son Callum and daughter Lilian. His most recent novel, A Private Man, was critically acclaimed and was shortlisted for the Commomwealth Prize and the Tasmanian Premier’s Award.

Reviews

[Petra X · Rating 4 out of 5]

The point of juries is to be judged by one's peers. This is interpreted quite differently in Australia which is the British system, everyone serves, to the US where they are selected. Juries in Australia, as in the UK, are as anonymous as its possible to be. Nothing is known about them before they appear in court, they may not ever discuss anything that went on in the jury room and the editors of this book were not even allowed to ask the author to elaborate on jury proceedings of the trial he sat on.

This means the author has to fill the book with discussion of surveys (mostly in New Zealand which has the same rules governing juries as Australia and the UK), plays and films. It is as interesting as he can make it, but its dry, dry, dry. It is hard to write much about a jury system that says if you are eligible, if you haven't got an excuse why you can't be there, then you have to sit, there is no selection process.

Americans have no such rules - everything is known before a jury sits, challenges seem to be unlimited and for anything at all. It turns trials into a type of game with each side selecting people they think will be most biased towards their argument. The secrecy of the jury room is out the window the moment the trial has finished and jurors may discuss, even on the court steps, what went on, and many do. Some make money from books, articles or appearing on tv.

On the island jury selection is very difficult and I imagine this is reflected in all small places. It follows the British system of if you haven't got a good reason not to serve, then you have to, no selection process. But only those who are citizens can sit. There aren't that many of them, lots are in the US, Canada or UK. A lot of our residents are ex-pats either here for the financial institutions or immigrants from the poorer islands. So this makes the jury pool very small.

Additionally, if the litigant or defendant is also a citizen, there is a good chance that you know them, at least by sight, if you aren't actually related or your next door neighbour's son works with them or similar. Then there is the issue of what if you do think the person is guilty and someone in your family also comes before the court, there is a chance that the guilty person's family or friends might be on the jury and go in for a bit of retaliation. There is continual talk of expanding the jury pool to include ex-pats who have been on the island for at least five years, but nothing ever comes of it.

Luckily there is not a lot of major crime on the island, so most of it gets dealt with in the magistrate's court, as in the UK and presumably Australia and New Zealand. Plea bargaining is allowed everywhere, a good proportion of the 70% of guilty pleas are probably plea bargains, but in the UK it isn't actually part of the system except for fraud cases. It is, if they plead guilty early on, they will get a lighter sentence (guaranteed). It is considered that this is coercive especially of young people.

In the US 98% of criminal cases in the federal courts end with a plea bargain, efficiency is prized over fairness and innocence. Sentences can be so draconian in the US, that the chance of being found guilty (especially if the person is black) that it is less of a risk to plead guilty than to risk losing many, many years of one's life.

My bf is up for jury service in early May but he is confident he will be dismissed because not only is he a law professor (one count against him, he might judge strictly by the law rather than be subject to emotional appeals) and he sat on Obama's taxation committee (two counts, he is 'known' and the media might write about him).

It would be interesting to read a book contrasting these different jury systems, plea deals, especially in regard to how they affect verdicts, sentencing and ultimately what people see as justice.

I read this a long time ago, but it is still clear in my mind. Some books don't make it past a week before I've forgotten them, like the waves washing a sandcastle away, some stay, rocky outcrops in the mind.

[zed · Rating 4 out of 5]

My anger knows no bounds as to an Australian high court decision on the quashing of a verdict that two lower courts had found on behalf of complaints against a high profile pedophile, a pedophile that has friends in extremely high places.

I was reminded of this book that I had read 15 years ago after I had spent a month on jury service and had been on 3 cases, one that involved rape and the other two pedophile. I can say it was a very draining experience that took a long time to recover from. I asked a lot of the whys and wherefores as to why this was such a harrowing experience and this book was one I read on the subject.

After the quashing of conviction by the high court I thought to myself "what is the point of the jury service if those found guilty can use their wealth and power to get as far as the high court that can then say that the jury got it wrong" Or as this item by the author of this book said that the high court had decided that the jury decision was "not rational". So let me get this straight. Juries are not rational? Have these oh so learned people of the high court just decided that they are the only ones who can decide rationality?

https://www.smh.com.au/by/malcolm-kno...

It is now an easy out to refuse to serve. The high stress level and then whats the point anyway? No doubt a rich and famous media organization can use its attack goons to make the victims (the real losers in all this) and the jurists irrelevant anyway.

This has been a truly disgraceful week and my anger knows no bounds.

[Kathy Fogarty · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read half this book before misplacing it in early 2016, convinced I'd left it in a waiting room or some such place where I take my books to pass time. I recently recovered it and am so glad. I haven't yet been called for jury duty but, in the event that I ever am, this book has taught me a great deal and in a thoroughly engaging way.

[Shane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Malcolm Knox is a writer well worth spending time with, whichever hat he’s wearing: investigative journalism or fiction. In Secrets of the Jury Room (2005), legal restrictions oblige him to wear both hats together. While his observations are no less engaging, when reading his account of the lengthy trial on which he served as juror, the narrative spine around which all his research is arranged, I found myself distracted by the fact that more than names have been changed. The at times bizarre-sounding quotes from the defendant kept me guessing as to just how much of the dialogue and its context are invented. Knox’s novelistic technique ensures a sense of immediacy, but the nonfiction content, instructive though it is, undercuts suspense; at one point I mislaid the book for weeks and didn’t miss it.

Yet when it resurfaced, the book proved compelling enough to finish. Through the course of it, Knox goes from ruing his reluctant empanelment to evangelism on the merits of the existing system, and ends with suggestions re how to improve conditions for and instructions to jurors. While discussed only briefly, the advantages, shown by studies, of evidence-driven over poll-driven decisions struck me as noteworthy not just judicially but politically.

[Ann Beames · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are three main areas covered in this book. The author gives an interesting and informative history of the origins of the jury system and how this has developed in English speaking countries. He details his own experience as an initially reluctant but eventually committed juror. Finally he makes some well considered recommendations to the courts for ways to help jurors in their duties. This book should be recommended reading for all law students, even for practising lawyers and judges and all administrators in the court system.

[Suz Bennett]

An interesting read about juries, their history and how they could be improved. Author has fictionalised his own jury service and it made me glad I have managed to avoid jury service myself.
I am like so many and only know what I have seen on TV which is mostly American and we don’t have same system.
It seems so random that bullies can let loose in the jury room and dominate discussions and outcomes. It would be good for anyone up for jury service to read this book. Though they may try harder to avoid it.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it! Fascinating and engaging look at the Australian jury system. Well researched and thought provoking. Excellent book for crime buffs.

[Allie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book came from one of those shops furnished with cardboard boxes full of the same 3 books that make you question the sanity (or sense of humour) of the creep in charge of giving manuscripts the ok. Biographies of reality TV stars from the UK circa 2002, family encyclopaedias of garden sourced home remedies, joke books. And ‘Secrets of the Jury Room’, plastered as it is with endorsements from QCs.

‘Secrets of the Jury Room’ looks at the role of juries in the Australian legal system, with discussions and evaluations of surveys of jurors that have been undertaken. The book follows a case in which Knox served as a juror, albeit with enough details and names changed as to make it untraceable. The case, as it appears in the book, is interesting enough to justify the length of the book, and give it pace enough to allow the examination of these issues.

It’s a light read, which throws up some interesting issues. How much power rests with the jury, and in the end, how much power rests with the juror with the loudest voice. What it’s like to serve on a jury, down to the stodgy hot food and reading on the train to the city. It’s an interesting insight into jury duty, and group dynamics under strange circumstances.

The importance of having community attitudes and values represented, and conveying to a jury the issues that they are to decide on. Or more importantly, those that they aren’t placed to adjudicate. The people that are on juries, those that manage to avoid it, and the slither of society that it ends up representing.

I was particularly interested in the issues around the interaction between the jury and lawyers. The second guessing, focusing on the clear ‘leader, the winks and nudges vs avoidance of eye contact. The tactics, and the complete mystery that juries are to lawyers. The way that jurors are able to be so powerful but in some cases are treated with little more than contempt. The way judges are held in such high esteem, and the way people act when put in such a clear role, with clear boundaries and expectations.

Given the 3 strikes it came with, it was ok. Shrug.

[Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting insight into what it is like to be on the jury of a criminal trial (which I have never done). The author suggests that jurors should be better informed and that certain groups of society should NOT be exempt!

[Jay · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am certainly more aware now of the constrictions placed on jurors that I was. My own jury service in Australia didn't progress to being selected so much of what Knox explains was informative. I must agree with the summing up at the end of the book about possible improvements to the system.

[Chris · Rating 2 out of 5]

Quite insightful, although the writing came across a little like a serialisation in a weekend lift-out. I kept having this strange feeling I was going to come across a "next week..."

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

2Cds. Best bit was at the end where Knox sums up the pros and cons of the jury/legal system and how things could be improved.

[Melanie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Got bored with this early on - maybe not in the right frame of mood. Will put it aside in case someone else wants it.