The administration of justice is an incredibly complex thing, contradictory and imposing an unprecedented responsibility on the one who administers it. At all times, the judge was the most respected, honorable and trustworthy person. But, nevertheless, any judge is primarily a person, and a judge with experience is also, in a sense, a blinded person who makes decisions daily, and therefore, perhaps, does not notice some little things that a person without experience will pay attention to .
It is precisely so that in every criminal case there are people who have their own fresh outlook on the events that have taken place, a jury trial was introduced in Russia. More precisely, it was not introduced, but returned, since it first appeared in Russia as far back as 1864 and existed until 1922, when it was abolished by the Soviet government.
The jury trial in Russia is a young phenomenon, and I must say that it is not particularly popular with people with a legal education or with the population itself. At the same time, the disputes surrounding him have not subsided for several decades, and everyone who has at least something to do with the activities of the courts and law enforcement agencies is trying to understand what is more in him - harm or benefit. It is worth noting that they defend the jury mainly with very vague arguments, since it is quite difficult to find the real advantages of this option of administering justice.
Jury trial: pros and cons
To understand how this type of court is adequate to the current state of affairs in Russia, and whether it has a right to exist (not on the basis of the Constitution, but on the basis of common sense), it is necessary to consider in detail all its essential aspects.
So, a jury trial is a form of legal proceedings in which a decision on the guilt or innocence of a person accused of committing a crime is taken by a group of 12 people who do not have special education and are brought together solely to reach a verdict in the case.
Experienced lawyers and judges consider this option of considering criminal cases to be a priori incorrect, since the jury makes a decision not on the basis of the case materials (although they, of course, familiarize themselves with them), but on the basis of their own experience. If a judge passes his verdict based solely on facts and focuses on the evidence of a crime, then for the jury it is often more important than the emotional and moral side of the case. In other words, the jury judges in terms of morality, and the judge in terms of law.
But it is no secret to anyone that in Russia morality and law have always been and are to this day in a state of some kind of hidden war. It is in connection with this that many of the crimes considered by a jury are considered on the moral side. In a number of cases, criminals, even pleading guilty, were released by jury due to the fact that from the point of view of the layman, far from the letter of the law, they did not do anything terrible.
The second negative aspect of the jury trial is its potential corruption. The people participating in the meetings are often unemployed, pensioners or housewives, that is, the least socially protected layer of the population. Working citizens, however, prefer not to participate in a jury trial - this distracts from the main work, takes time, effort and imposes a responsibility for which they are not ready. Therefore, when the question arises of whether it is easy to put pressure on the jury, there is no doubt in a person familiar with Russian realities. In this regard, many professionals believe that the only ones who benefit from the existence of a jury in Russia are the criminals themselves. Always able to put pressure on either pity or poverty of the jury.