Street History Classroom: British and Australian Cases Demonstrate Jury Functions - Day 16 of the Sit-in Protest Against the Inclusion of the Lay Assessor System Bill in the Legislative Yuan's Extraordinary Session

The "Alliance for the Concurrent Trial Runs of Jury and Lay Assessor Systems," composed of civil society groups including the Judicial Reform Foundation and the Taiwan Association for Parliament/People's Participation in Trials, held a press conference titled "Street History Classroom: British and Australian Cases Demonstrate Jury Functions" at 9:30 a.m. on July 14 in front of the main gate of the Legislative Yuan. Using real historical cases from 18th-century Britain—where, despite the persecution of people's rights by bad laws and the judicial system, juries still rendered verdicts based on conscience and realized the people's judicial justice—the press conference explained the function of the jury in checking and balancing the state apparatus's persecution of the people.

Attorney Chang Ching first speculated on the Judicial Yuan's reasons for opposing the concurrent system. He pointed out that aside from the issue of losing official face if a system that the Judicial Yuan has studied for a long time is changed, there are also three substantive issues: first, the lay assessor system makes it easier to control the opinions of participating citizens (i.e., lay judges); second, the Judicial Yuan worries that its own lay judge proposal will not be chosen by the people after six years of concurrent operation of the two systems; third, judges are unwilling to surrender their current power of fact-finding—which is crucial in determining whether a defendant is guilty—and the closely related power of evidence investigation (Note: A judge's five major powers in court include fact-finding, evidence investigation, application and interpretation of law, sentencing, and litigation procedure direction). The jury system in the current civil society version, on the other hand, would hand over the power of fact-finding to the jury and the power of evidence investigation to the prosecution and defense, substantially cutting into the vast scope of the judge's sole discretion; therefore, the Judicial Yuan is unwilling to introduce the jury system.
Attorney Chang stated that Taiwan's judges currently suffer from three major ailments: corruption, being political hitmen, and being "dinosaur judges" (out-of-touch judges). The smaller the institutional authority of judges and the more independent judgment space participating citizens have, the better these ailments can be resolved. The lay assessor system tends to condone the authoritarian influence of professional judges on the opinions of lay judges, allowing these three ailments to persist while wearing the veneer of having the people endorse the verdict. In contrast, under the jury system, professional judges cannot influence the nine jurors who independently find the facts, meaning those in power cannot use judges as political hitmen to politically persecute political opponents. Furthermore, through the introduction of the public perspective and the power to independently find facts, the problems of out-of-touch and corrupt professional judges can be resolved.
Reviewing the communication process with the Secretary-General of the Judicial Yuan and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus, Attorney Chang stated that the Judicial Yuan leaves the people with no choice; should the implementation of the lay assessor system fail, it would be a triple-loss for the DPP, the Judicial Yuan, and the people. However, if given a choice between the two systems and the people ultimately choose the lay assessor system, the Judicial Yuan could not only convince proponents of the jury system, but it would also be a triple-win for the DPP, the Judicial Yuan, and the people. In addition, apart from the DPP, all other three opposition caucuses support the jury system, which is explicitly written in the DPP's party platform—a rarity in legislative history. If the DPP can also support at least the concurrent trial runs of the two systems, it would be a fine achievement of the ruling and opposition parties uniting to promote judicial reform for the first time in the legislative history of the Republic of China, and it would better align with the DPP's own founding spirit.

Attorney Cheng Wen-lung, founding chairperson of the Taiwan Association for Parliament/People's Participation in Trials, illustrated the spirit of the jury system with two actual Anglo-American cases. In 1760, William Penn, later the founder of Pennsylvania, was prosecuted in Britain for practicing his faith in the Quaker religion, which was prohibited by the law at the time, by praying on the street. At that time, despite the pressure of the judge refusing to provide food and imprisoning them in an attic, the jury still adhered to their conscience and returned a unanimous verdict of not guilty. After returning the unanimous not-guilty verdict, the jurors themselves were fined and even imprisoned by the judge, and Edward Bushel, one of the jurors at the time, actively sought legal remedies for this and was eventually acquitted and released. He also reiterated the first Australian jury case introduced at the press conference on July 11: when the thief Susanna was being transported into exile, the captain of the prison ship, relying on the laws of the time which dictated that prisoners had no protection of rights, legally misappropriated the public donations Susanna had received. In the end, the Australian jury ruled in favor of Susanna. Attorney Cheng emphasized through these two cases that juries can render verdicts based on fairness, conscience, and social justice, and can even break the authority of the king and conservative laws at the time, effectively checking and balancing the persecution of the people by those in power.

Attorney Cheng also called on the current ruling party not to emulate autocratic regimes in eliminating the jury. He pointed out that the occurrence of the American Revolution was related to the British King's intention at the time to retract the implementation of the jury system, and recently the Chinese Communist Party also confiscated the jury system through Article 46 of the Hong Kong National Security Law, exclusively utilizing appointed judges to try political cases. He further suggested that, returning to the context of the Age of Discovery, sailors often died of scurvy due to a lack of vitamin C during ocean voyages. Precisely because British doctors conducted large-scale experiments feeding sailors vegetables, the number of British sailors dying of scurvy dropped dramatically, making Britain a maritime superpower. Using this as an analogy, Attorney Cheng called on the Judicial Yuan to learn from the early British spirit of daring to experiment, and to courageously include the jury system—which has been adopted in many countries—as an option during judicial reform, giving Taiwan an opportunity for institutional progress.

Attending Representatives

Attorney Cheng Wen-lung / Founding Chairperson, Taiwan Association for Parliament/People's Participation in Trials (Convener)
Attorney Chang Ching / Member, National Congress on Judicial Reform

Press Contacts

Judicial Reform Foundation / Director Hsiao I-min
Taiwan Association for Parliament/People's Participation in Trials / Deputy Secretary-General Lin Ping-ch'üan