Scrapping Jury Trials Won’t Solve Britain’s Legal Backlog

'Scrapping Jury Trials Is an Attempt to Fix a Broken Justice System by Smashing It to Pieces'

Anyone who has ever sat on a jury or taken part in a Crown Court trial as an advocate, witness, expert or Judge, knows that to dismiss them as no more than an exercise in administering the criminal law and determining guilt or innocence is a massive over-simplification.  A Crown Court trial is first and foremost about people. Individuals who, because of poor luck, bad decision making, a particular predilection towards a criminality that sits in …

Scrapping jury trials won’t solve Britain’s legal backlog

A wise man once said that “jury trials are a fundamental part of our democratic settlement. Criminal trials without juries are a bad idea.” High office has a habit of deadening such wisdom, and now David Lammy, the Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, is proposing to abolish the ancient institution he had once defended for all but a few crimes. It would be one thing if, having decided that the jury was an institution not adapted to modern cond…

POLL OF THE DAY: Do you support scrapping jury trials for all but the most serious crimes?

Only rape, murder, manslaughter and so-called 'public interest' cases would be heard by juries under David Lammy's plans

Britain’s Plan to Abolish Most Jury Trials Should Make Us Grateful for the Constitution

This is an abomination that, thanks to the Sixth Amendment, could not happen here in the United States.

Removing jury trials is a democratic outrage

In June 2020 the impact of Covid led some to argue that trial by jury should be temporarily suspended. David Lammy, who was at the time the shadow justice secretary, strongly opposed the idea. He tweeted: ‘Jury trials are a fundamental part of our democratic settlement. Criminal trials without juries are a bad idea.’ It

Lammy's reported curb on jury trials 'a step too far'

Law Society says government can cut the Crown court backlog without resorting to extreme measures.