"The jury will disregard that last statement."

[Serious Mozzarella]

I don’t understand this shit. I see it all the time on legal shows, and like…

When I had jury duty, and the guy said something insanely incriminating, and I was told to disregard it, I thought, “pfffft, fuck that, this dude’s guilty,” you know?

But in legal shows, juries ACTUALLY disregard things? The fuck, bro.

 

[Tiger Chaos Theory]

Always wondered this myself, how does one simply pretend something didn't happen?

 

[GI Cake]

Is it just me, or does SVU have a dirty habbit of giving the killer/Rapist like a two minute cameo. Then like, 45 minutes later the cops found out it was the guy that held the elevator for them or some shit?

 

[Loveless]

Makes perfect sense if you understand why some things are meant to be disregarded.

 

[Serious Mozzarella]

Is it just me, or does SVU have a dirty habbit of giving the killer/Rapist like a two minute cameo. Then like, 45 minutes later the cops found out it was the guy that held the elevator for them or some shit?

It's just you. SVU spends half an episode finding him, maybe even less, then the second half trying to convict him.

 

[Serious Mozzarella]

Makes perfect sense if you understand why some things are meant to be disregarded.

I understand why things are to be disregarded. That's not what I'm saying. If someone is like, "there is absolutely solid DNA evidence to suggest that you, and you alone, did this crime."

"Objection! That evidence was suppressed!"

"Sustained! The jury will disregard!"

Like, I'm not going to disregard that shit.

 

[Loveless]

I understand why things are to be disregarded. That's not what I'm saying. If someone is like, "there is absolutely solid DNA evidence to suggest that you, and you alone, did this crime."

"Objection! That evidence was suppressed!"

"Sustained! The jury will disregard!"

Like, I'm not going to disregard that shit.

Then you should be questioning why it was suppressed because there's almost certainly a very good reason.

 

[Harthan]

This isn't Nam, damn it! There are rules!

There are things the jury is instructed to disregard. For example, pleading the fifth is not to be construed as an admission of guilt, and so on. I'm not intimate with all the details but yeah, the jury can be told not to take something into account. Technically, of course, the jury can do whatever they please.

 

[Loveless]

Technically, of course, the jury can do whatever they please.

Technically they can but all it takes is a complaint from 1 juror that the jury is disregarding orders and the whole case gets thrown out. As a juror you do what you're told, if you can't follow orders then you shouldn't be there.

 

[Harthan]

Technically they can but all it takes is a complaint from 1 juror that the jury is disregarding orders and the whole case gets thrown out. As a juror you do what you're told, if you can't follow orders then you shouldn't be there.

I was thinking more along the lines of jury nullification, i.e. the jury's free to decide whatever they like for any reason they like.

 

[Loveless]

Yeah I know. What I meant is that once there's an argument that the jury has been prejudiced by something they weren't supposed to know, that case is over, dead in the water. In some cases it won't even reach the jury, the moment something comes out that wasn't meant to, the judge will throw the case out.