Law Reform Commission publishes report on juries

On 15 April, the Law Reform Commission (LRC) published its Report on Jury Service. Mr Justice Adrian Hardiman, Judge of the Supreme Court, launched the report at the Commission’s offices.

The report examines issues surrounding jury service in Ireland including qualification for jury service, jury tampering, jury misconduct, expenses, complex jury trials and empirical research on the jury process. The report contains 56 recommendations and includes a draft Juries Bill intended to implement these.

Recommendations outlined in the report include the following:

• Jury panels should be based on the electoral registers. This would allow EU citizens and other long-term residents to qualify for jury service and would make around 200,000 extra people available for jury duty.
• The existing blanket excusal from jury service “as of right” for public servants and professionals including doctors, nurses and teachers should be repealed and be replaced by the individualised right of excusal “for good cause.”
• Jurors should receive a "modest" daily payment for expenses.
• Judges should be allowed to empanel up to three extra jurors where a case is estimated to last more than three months.
• In complex trials, judges should have the discretion to appoint an assessor, or adviser, to assist the court and help juries understand evidence.
• The number of preemptory challenges (objections to jurors) for both prosecution and defence should remain at 7.
• A person with a disability should be eligible for jury service unless the disability would mean that he or she could not perform the duties of a juror. The Report also recommends that specific research should be conducted on this matter.
• Further research should be carried out on matters such as jury representativeness, juror comprehension, juror management and juror capacity and competence.

The report also highlights concerns about the extent to which wireless technology might allow jurors to search online for information about the accused (rather than limit their decision to the evidence presented) and proposes that the inappropriate accessing of information on the internet by juries be made a specific offence.

The Immigrant Council of Ireland has welcomed the proposals to make some migrants eligible for jury duty. Denise Charlton, Chief Executive of the Immigration Council said "Any step which removes barriers which prevent migrants from participating fully in Irish life is to be welcomed, and on that basis we believe the proposal from the Law Reform Commission is a positive step."

The Free Legal Advice Centres (FLAC) also welcomed the Law Reform Commission's call to make juries more representative however they said that it is regrettable that the proposed changes do not include measures to include deaf and blind people on jury panels.  Responding to concerns raised in the report about the presence of interpreters during jury discussions, FLAC called for steps to be taken to include deaf and blind people to serve on inquest juries and civil cases like defamation, which do not raise the same concerns as criminal trials.

FLAC which has previously taken cases on behalf of deaf persons wanting to serve on juries said “the jury pool cannot be truly representative if it excludes a whole group of people who are fully able to participate in a jury with the assistance of a sign language interpreter”.

Click here to read the report in full

Click here to read the LRC consultation paper on jury service 

Click here to read an Irish Times article and here to read an article from the journal.ie

Click here to read a FLAC press release