Unfinished Business by Paul Ferris & Stuart Wheatman & Steve Wraith

Author:Paul Ferris & Stuart Wheatman & Steve Wraith [Ferris, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Mojo Risin' Publishing
Published: 2018-11-07T20:00:00+00:00

Finally ladies and gentlemen, you will consider each of these charges separately and weigh the evidence relating to them separately in the scales of justice, and only if you are satisfied beyond reasonable doubt of each will you return a verdict of guilty on that charge. There are three verdicts open to you, namely guilty, not guilty and not proven and I have put these in alphabetical order so that there should be no prejudice. The last two, not guilty and not proven, are both verdicts of acquittal, not guilty being the more forceful acquittal, and of course it follows from what I have said to you that you return separate verdicts on each of the charges, as I have already charged you. Your verdicts can be given unanimously or by a majority, but if the verdict is to be guilty of anything criminal, there must be at least eight of your number in favour of that view, and that is really quite obvious if you think about it. There has got to be an absolute majority of the 15 of you before you can convict, at least eight out of 15. You could in theory have a majority for guilty with seven only because there are two other verdicts. That’s not enough for a conviction. You’ve got to have eight. If you do not have eight for guilty of any particular charge, then you must substitute an acquittal on that charge.

When you retire you may care to select one of your number to be foreman or forewoman, to collect your views, to act as chairman and to speak for you when you return. The foreman will be asked in respect of each charge whether you are agreed on your verdict, and if so, what the verdict is, so please make that clear particularly in regard to Charge 4, and if you are striking out something in regard for example to Charge 1, please make it clear what you are striking out. You will also be asked whether your verdict in each case is unanimous or by a majority so please will the foreman note that, or the forewoman note that. We are not concerned about the actual arithmetic, but simply whether the result is a unanimous or a majority result. Now, I can take the verdicts from you at any time when you have resolved all the issued.

Are there any other points counsel wish to put to me before they duly retire?

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.