Opinion ID: 1407576
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 22

Heading: juror evaluation of evidence

Text: While the conviction-proneness studies ( ante, pp. 27-42) may indicate that guilt phase includable jurors will tend to differ in their decisions on guilt or innocence from Witherspoon -qualified jurors, they do not themselves directly explain how these differing conclusions come about. Some inferences as to how this occurs may be drawn from the attitude [101] and demographic [102] surveys. In the evidentiary hearing below, three studies by Ellsworth were used to suggest some possible mechanism[s] by which these attitude[ ] [differences] might translate into the relevant behavior. One study, referred to below as the Ellsworth Post-Deliberation Follow-up Study, sought to measure the differences in jurors' thresholds of reasonable doubt by measuring the regret they might feel if they returned an erroneous verdict (either conviction or acquittal) in a criminal case. (Cf., ante, fn. 101.) The subjects in this study were all persons eligible for jury service in California. Fourteen were guilt phase includable and fifteen were Witherspoon -qualified. The subjects were asked to imagine that they had actually served on a jury in a homicide case, that the jury had reached a unanimous verdict, and that they later learned that the verdict was wrong. They were then asked to rate on a scale from 1 to 100 the amount of regret they would feel for each type of erroneous verdict in such a case. Two types of erroneous verdicts were possible: (1) the conviction of an innocent person, or the conviction of a guilty person for a degree of homicide more severe than the true crime warranted (Ellsworth called this harsh error), and (2) the acquittal of a guilty person, or the conviction of a guilty person for a degree of homicide less severe than the true crime warranted (denoted lenient error). [103] Ellsworth found that the Witherspoon -qualified subjects expressed equal regret for harsh and lenient errors, whereas the guilt phase includable subjects felt a considerably higher amount of regret for harsh errors than for lenient errors. The differences were statistically significant. (P ante, fn. 101.) A second study was conducted to determine whether the two groups also differed in their perception of the credibility of defense and prosecution witnesses. [104] The subjects in this study were 36 persons who had previously participated in the Ellsworth Conviction-Proneness Study. Sixteen were guilt phase includable and twenty were Witherspoon -qualified. [105] Ellsworth had prepared a 20-minute videotaped simulation of the conflicting testimony of a white police officer and a black defendant on trial for assaulting the officer. The simulated case involved a physical confrontation between the officer and the defendant during what the officer described as a routine crowd-control incident and the defendant described as police harassment. The experimenters' intention was to create two equally likely versions of the event. The script had been reviewed for realism by a group of lawyers and psychologists, and the videotape had been pretested for plausibility. The videotape was shown to 36 subject/jurors, who were then asked 16 questions concerning (1) the accuracy and truthfulness of the 2 witnesses; (2) the extent to which specific facts mentioned by each witness seemed to be true; and (3) the appropriateness of each witness' behavior. On each of the 16 questions the Witherspoon -qualified subject/jurors gave (as a group) answers that were more favorable to the police officer than did the guilt phase includable group. The differences were statistically significant, with a p value of .05 or less, on 10 of the 16 questions. Summing up the responses to all questions revealed an overall difference of about 20 percent in the groups' assessments of credibility. This disparity was statistically significant at less than a .0002 level. Ellsworth testified that this study demonstrated a way in which the different attitudes that these people come in with do translate into different perceptions. And those perceptions are ... very relevant to the actual behavior that jurors would engage in [when] deciding on guilt or innocence, that is, your perception of how credible various witnesses are. The results of the Ellsworth Witness-Credibility Study were replicated to some extent in the Ellsworth Conviction-Proneness Study. As previously indicated, after the subject/jurors of the latter study had indicated their personal beliefs as to the accused's guilt or innocence, most of them were divided into 12-person juries and allowed to deliberate. (Cf., ante, fn. 78.) Some of the juries were composed entirely of Witherspoon -qualified jurors and some had a mixture of Witherspoon -qualified and guilt phase includable jurors. [106] After one hour, the deliberations were terminated and the subjects given a written questionnaire to fill out. Among the items on the questionnaire were six questions asking How believable was the testimony? of each of the six witnesses who testified. As shown by the chart below, the Witherspoon -qualified jurors (the D.Q. jurors in the chart) believed each of the prosecution witnesses more than the guilt phase includable jurors (Excl.) did. As for the two defense witnesses, their credibility was rated higher by the guilt phase includable jurors than by the Witherspoon -qualified jurors. As Ellsworth testified, these results can be considered simply a replication across a whole series of witnesses in a different [situation] of what we got in the witness credibility study.