VERDICT WATCH MA - Professor Karen Read, 43, charged with murdering police officer boyfriend John O'Keefe by hitting him with car, Canton, 14 Apr 2023 #15

[detective.moon]

forgive me if this is a silly question (i’m not from the US and my country doesn’t even have juries in court!), but what will be the options if there’s a hung jury? either retrial or the case is simply… dismissed without a verdict? or are there other things that could happen?

 

[TTF14]

The judge looked almost scared to me. I wonder what her facial expression and demeanor say about what the split was/is.

IMO

 

[Wishbone]

I called it IIRC at 13 hours deliberation that there is a hung jury. A hung jury is not good for either side, no matter how the defense and prosecution would spin it. I wonder if the jury is still hung and the judge calls it, if the prosecution would retry the case.

a hung jury may not be good, but it is better for the defense than a guilty

 

[MysteryFanatic]

This unaminous ruling has to change. It should be a 75% majority, except in cases where the defendant is facing a possible charge of execution.

I firmly believe that even when there is a long-time deliberation and finally there is a verdict and jurors are polled asking them if they agree with the verdict, I think the one or more jurors that did not agree with the majority really don't agree with the verdict but go along with it just so they can get done with it.

 

[TTF14]

forgive me if this is a silly question (i’m not from the US and my country doesn’t even have juries in court!), but what will be the options if there’s a hung jury? either retrial or the case is simply… dismissed without a verdict? or are there other things that could happen?

They can retry. It's up to the Commonwealth.

 

[fluffypaste]

This unaminous ruling has to change. It should be a 75% majority, except in cases where the defendant is facing a possible charge of execution.

That's a draconian solution to an uncommon situation which simply doesn't require such a drastic remedy. We're witnessing something pretty rare, here.

 

[TTF14]

The defense didn’t say they wamted a hung jury. They wanted the Allen statement read to the jury whereas the prosecution wants to wait to even have that read. Judge agreed w/the prosecution and is holding the big gun back for later.

I don't understand what the difference is. Just more words?

 

[Curiousobserver]

I believe it would be retried.

This is a grudge-match for them now, I think it will be re-tried.

 

[kittythehare]

The judge looked almost scared to me. I wonder what her facial expression and demeanor say about what the split was/is.

IMO

I never saw that expression on her face before either.
does she know what the split is, I wonder?

 

[jepop]

I hope this doesn’t put undue pressure on the jury to settle on a verdict for the sake of pleasing the court.

Exactly

 

[LaineyJ]

I don't understand what the difference is. Just more words?

It’s an additional instruction — arielilane posted a link a page or two back I think to an example of the instructions. Different name but when I googled Allen statement, it was the same thing

ETA here’s the link https://www.mass.gov/doc/2460-when-jurors-cannot-agree/download

 

[TTF14]

I never saw that expression on her face before either.
does she know what the split is, I wonder?

I think she does. I'm listening to Defense Diaries and they seem to agree she probably knows the split, but the attorneys do not.

 

[jepop]

The only people who should be tried is Proctor and his henchmen.

Yes

 

[MysteryFanatic]

a hung jury may not be good, but it is better for the defense than a guilty

True. But I think Karen Read would really not be pleased with a hung jury, because then there will always be a question mark above her head. It doesn't clear her that she could have possibly done the unthinkable. And really a NG verdict doesn't mean a person is innocent, it just means there was enough reasonable doubt to say that a person is 100% guilty.

 

[themonk]

CW should switch it up and try trying the right people next time

 

[detective.moon]

They can retry. It's up to the Commonwealth.

and if they don’t retry, nothing else happens?

 

[Slick762]

This unaminous ruling has to change. It should be a 75% majority, except in cases where the defendant is facing a possible charge of execution.

I disagree. Unanimous is a better way. SCOTUS disagrees too. Ramos v Louisiana 2020.
Military juries aren't unanimous and it's a cluster frak sometimes.

 

[jepop]

Imagine if it was one (or two or three) juror using their reason after considering the actual evidence holding out against the rest. I don't see them budging but probably same in opposite direction of one juror (or a few) holding out after reaching their decision through processes unrelated to rational reasoning, Jmo

 

[fluffypaste]

I know for a fact that there are countries where if deliberations go on for a long time, the jury can ask to deliver a non-unanimous verdict, as long as there is only 1 dissenter. However, the USA is not one of those countries.

The Supreme Court relatively recently ruled that non-unanimous guilty verdicts are always unconstitutional, no exceptions.

 

[Slick762]

This is why having not guilty tabs on all charges on the jury form is important.
If the jury deadlocks on a specific lesser charge, they can still acquit on the other charges. Without those 'not guilty' options, the CW could retry on all lesser charges, even if the jury had unanimous voted not guilty on some of them.
Say the jury is only deadlocked on the involuntary manslaughter charge but voted to acquit on vehicular manslaughter. Without a jury form that shows they specifically deadlocked on that; the CW could recharge vehicular manslaughter.