Originally Posted by
Melchior
Yes, actually. US legal code states that the evidence and the arguments of the prosecution must hold up beyond reasonable doubt. At least for murder trials - the more sever the crime, the less doubt allowed to the prosecution. This is acknowledged to be subjective, which is why strong evidence and arguments are needed. Otherwise, you should vote not guilty. If everyone votes not guilty, the person is acquitted. They go free. If everyone votes guilty, the person is charged. The judge sentences them according to the law and their own judgement (which can be later overturned). If the jury cannot all agree, you have a hung jury. In that case, while the defendent is not found guilty or non-guilty, no verdict can be given. It is not quite letting them free, but unless the prosecution can present new evidence and convince the judicial department to retry the case, the person goes free. "Innocent until proven guilty".
What happened was that the 8th Juror felt that the evidence supplied was treated as solid rather than more circumstantial, and that there was not enough decent evidence to prove that it happened as the prosecution claimed. Could the kid have stabbed his dad? Yes. Did the prosecution prove it happened the way they said it did? That's what the 8th Juror was arguing against. The prosecution not only has to prove the crime occurred, but that the defendant performed the crime, and how the defendant did it. While the charge was plausible, the evidence supporting that had holes or other issues that the jurors could discover and identify, which made the entire thing suspect. Basically, all of the questions brought up during the play/movie should have been things the cops/detectives on the case had already researched, and should have addressed during the trial. They did not, thus the actual evidence became much more shaky, introducing the doubt. Thus the vote of "not guilty".
My last term of jury duty was actually a hung case. While there was no doubt in our minds that a crime had been committed, and that others had performed it, the actual defendent's active participation was not proven (basically, he was either a victim, or a willing dupe). Some of us thought he should have been aware enough to realize what was going on and that continuing to do what he was doing violated the law, while others thought the people not currently on trial managed to fool him into being an unknown accomplice.
I... took a lot of law and civil rights classes in high school and college? And lit?