Following are just a few of the reasons all Americans should be suspicious of our current justice system. This is not to say we should not have some system of justice, but that in the very least, it is in need of vast reform. My personal opinion is that our entire justice system should be placed in the hands of private organizations. That may be too extreme for most, but if nothing else, I hope you’ll agree that our system is not serving us well. At least not all of us. Spend a few minutes reading this and let me know if you agree or disagree. If you disagree, tell me where you believe my assertions are wrong.
CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
This is from a story by the Great Tom Woods: Let’s say we have a dispute with one another and I suggest we let my mother be the arbitrator. I say, “Well, my mother has judged over 100 disputes with me and others, and three or four times she’s ruled in favor of my opponent,” suggesting that she can be objective and fair. Would that seem fair to you? That’s exactly what happens when someone sues the government for being wronged by that government. We’re asking the people in black robes to rule impartially against those to whom they rely upon for their livelihood. This is by definition a conflict of interest. I find it humorous that the very people who cry loudest about conflicts of interest are in fact the ones participating in it.
Did I say RIGGED?
JURY SELECTION
I suggest that our current system of jury selection be eliminated entirely. We should just choose the first 12 (or six, depending upon the type of trial) people on the jury rolls or at least just randomly select them from the pool of jurors. That would be fair. What is not fair is allowing the attorneys to conspicuously dismiss jurors. This incentivizes attorneys with the sole purpose of winning, not finding justice. We could allow for judges to allow exemptions for health and other reasons, but beyond that, we should just let it be random. Let’s take a look at the voir dire process, which is where the opposing attorneys examine the pool of jurors to see if they’re acceptable for the trial. Jurors are eliminated from the jury for one of three reasons:
- Peremptory Challenge. Attorneys from both sides are permitted to excuse potential juries for any reason, without required justification. They are in fact “sized up” by the attorneys, sometimes through careful analysis of their response to questions, prior research, or even because of the way they look. Attorneys are always given a specific number of jurors they are permitted to dismiss.
- For Cause. One of the attorneys may request exempting a potential juror for their response to questions by those attorneys. Either attorney may suggest the juror should be disqualified because they believe the juror cannot be impartial. In reality, they are typically dismissed because they believe, for whatever reason, the juror will not rule in their favor. Anyone who has a lick of common sense knows this is what is happening during jury selection. It’s the very reason why expensive lawyers rely on professional jury analysts.
- Judge Decision. The judge may dismiss the juror for whatever reason he or she likes, but with finesse by using fancy legal jargon that makes it sound legitimate.
This nearly always results in a bias against the defendant. Let us not forget, defendants are purportedly always deemed innocent until proven guilty. When a prosecutor or plaintiff’s attorney dismisses someone because they believe they won’t rule in their favor, they are impeding the very purpose of a random selection of a jury of the defendant’s peers. Not to mention, it virtually guarantees that some remaining jurors will remain who will not rule in favor of one or the other. Eliminating someone who may likely be sympathetic toward the defendant is a gross injustice (see discussion of Jury Nullification below).
In November of 2019, I was dismissed from a jury, for cause, because I responded to a during voir dire question from the prosecutor, claiming I did not trust the police officer witness more than I trusted the defendant. I didn’t know either of them, so why would I defer to the arresting officer simply because he was the accuser? This is the very definition of impartiality. Once again, the so-called objective justice system leans in favor of the prosecution. That this dismissal for cause was allowed by the judge was a gross miscarriage of justice.
Did I say RIGGED?
PLEA DEALS, PUBLIC DEFENDERS, AND PROBATION ABUSE
Public defenders, who are paid by the state, are incentivized to get their defendants to accept a plea deal. Why? Because if every defendant chose to go to trial, the system would collapse under its own weight. Everyone in the system wants to continue this assembly line of prosecutorial abuse. If you think otherwise, I suggest you spend a day in a courtroom to observe the proceedings, particularly those for misdemeanor crimes. I’ve done this several times. What you’ll find is a clownish process where lawyers (many of which are public defenders) approach the desk in the courtroom where the prosecutor entertains plea deals. There is literally a line of attorneys waiting to speak to the attorneys, just prior to the proceedings with the judge. They typically spend approximately three to five minutes making their case to the prosecuting attorney.
This is not what you see on television or films, where attorneys call the prosecutors or meet them outside the courtroom to make a deal. The public defenders, who have often spent less than five minutes with their clients, spend another few minutes trying to cut a deal with the prosecutor. The defendants, who are by definition too poor to afford a good attorney, typically don’t have a clue about the intricacies of the legal system. They’re told the best opportunity they have is to plea guilty. Even if they’re innocent. Why? They’re told if they don’t and they go to trial, if they lose they’ll get a harsher sentence if found guilty. This is often accompanied by advice that they are likely to be found guilty, regardless if that is true or not. And with representation like that, why should they expect otherwise. A good attorney would carefully examine the case and offer their best opinion on the likelihood of success or failure.
Ask yourself, does it seem fair that if a prosecutor offers a lighter sentence, that if rejected, the maximum sentence would be applied? That’s called coercion. It’s not a viable choice. Yet the vast majority of criminal cases are adjudicated in this manner. This is why vast swaths of people charged with petty crimes end up being classified as criminals, often when they are in fact not.
In drug-related charges, defendants are often offered probation to avoid jail time. Their alternative includes the stipulation that they must appear for random urinalysis tests for which they must pay, an admission of their “addictions,” drug-court stipulations such as required Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, etc. For those who don’t live in more progressive urban areas, even minor drug charges such as possession of marijuana, are subjected to this nonsense. Imagine forcing people to admit to being addicts, going to twelve-step programs, appearing for and paying to have urine testing, often causing them to miss work, just so they can avoid going to jail for a minor charge, where 60 miles away they are merely given a fine like a traffic ticket. This happens every day in rural America. All of this for possessing a joint. And let’s not forget, nearly 40% of urinalysis tests yield false positives. Worse than that, an inconclusive result (often caused by drinking too much water) is considered a positive. And the icing on the cake is that if someone doesn’t show up on time to pay for a urinalysis, sometimes caused by fear of being fired for leaving work, this is considered an automatic violation of probation. Then guess what happens. They automatically go to jail as if they hadn’t pleaded out in the first place.
Did I say RIGGED?
JURY NULLIFICATION
This is by far the most egregious of all the built-in injustices of our so-called justice system. What is jury nullification? It’s what happens when a jury returns a verdict of Not Guilty despite its belief that the defendant is guilty of the violation charged. It’s a tool juries can use to set aside a law they believe is immoral or wrongly applied to the accused. Because most people are victims of watching television and films, we’ve been brainwashed into believing that juries are supposed to judge if the defendant violated a law, even if they believe the law is unjust. This is absolutely not the case, even though juries are given this instruction every day in this land. In some states, judges will disallow any mention of jury nullification. These judges are not acting in concordance with the U.S. Constitution.
Our jury system was set up precisely to allow the use of nullification. In fact, In the early 1800s, nullification was practiced in cases brought under the Alien and Sedition Act. In the mid-1800s, northern juries practiced nullification in prosecutions brought against individuals accused of harboring slaves in violation of the Fugitive Slave Laws. Eventually, these laws were overturned because they were both immoral and unjust, even though they were considered “the law of the land.” Furthermore, a Supreme Court ruling confirmed that jury nullification is not illegal and that decision has never been overruled.
Jury nullification is our last defense against unjust laws. Most everyone finds themselves feeling helpless when they see legislation they find unjust or immoral, no matter which political persuasion they belong to. Nullification is our last line of defense against abuse, neglect, incompetence, and out-of-control legislators of the state.
That most jurisdictions will not allow instructions to enlighten juries of their right to nullification is as clear a violation of public trust as one can imagine. In my experience on a jury pool in Kentucky, I found that the juror’s handbook overtly states that nullification is prohibited. I suspect this is the case nearly everywhere.
Did I say RIGGED? Tell my why I’m wrong in concluding that it is.