Court Opinion

ID: 9793327
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:46:08.011103+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:04:31.016777
License: Public Domain

KINGSLEY, J.*
I concur in Justice Mosk’s opinion.
I have read with interest the scholarly opinion by Justice Kaus on the subject of “jury nullification,” but do not agree that that doctrine has anything to do with the case at bench. The concept of “jury nullification” is one that permits a jury to ignore the plain letter of the law and administer what those 12 persons, as a body, regard the socially more appropriate verdict in a particular case. The doctrine represents what Dean Pound called a “soft spot” in the law, which permitted the law to yield in a special case rather than cast doubt on the justice of the applicable law in general.
*494Here, however, the majority of the court is not ignoring the law. The constitutional provision against cruel and unusual punishment is, itself, a vital part of the law which we apply in the case of young Mr. Dillon. It is now settled that that provision in both the federal and California Constitutions prohibits the application of an otherwise valid sanction to a particular person under particular circumstances. We are not ignoring the law of California; we are applying the whole law.

Assigned by the Chairperson of the Judicial Council.