My opinion on it is more of a question. How do we trust a juror who lied in the jury selection process? He was admitted, when another juror could have replaced him. Is it reasonable to think Chauvin only had a potentially unbiased jury of 11? If so, shouldn’t that draw serious concern on due process?
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I believe you would have to prove the juror was unbiased, not that he was misleading answering questions during selection.
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That burden would be in the prosecution, right? Imo, it’s a tough thing to prove, especially when there is evidence he was deceptive in the jury selection process.
Being deceptive during selection is nothing new and to an extent expected. Courts are loathe to retry cases when a verdict has been reached so it would have to be pretty cut and dry that juror was biased.
Wearing a blm shirt with the ubiquitous and popular “I can’t breathe” wouldn’t be enough. Texts, emails, snapchat, wtnesses etc showing a bias would probably be needed too.
I believe the burden now rests on chauvin during his appeals as he was unanimously convicted by a jury. Think about all the court cases you see in documentaries that lose on appeal even with blatant prosecutorial misconduct…
I’m not a lawyer
I’m no expert either. Probably would need to look at court cases in which something similar happened.
Doesn’t the defense just need to show the juror was questionable? Then the prosecution would need to show why they are wrong. At least that is what makes sense to me, as the “promise” of a fair trial is on the state.
Its also a big F-up on the defense to not suss this issue out beforehand. It would be real easy for the defense to let a “bad” juror on for a trial they knew they were going to lose, just so they could appeal it and buy more free time for their client. Rinse and repeat and a murder suspect spends 6 months in, 2 years out for an indeterminate amount of time while his court cases play out. For this reason and others (ie the big cost of a trial like this), the court is loathe to overturn jury verdicts and especially loathe to overturn based on suspicion of a juror not being unbiased. Remember, Chauvin was assumed innocent until proven guilty. He has now been proven guilty. he is no longer assumed innocent in the eyes of our justice system.
A fair trial is not the same as a perfect trial.
That is a good point.
In this trial, with no change of venue, it would be reasonable to think he potentially had an unbiased jury of 0.
Potentially, but in this one there is evidence of lying about actions that would exclude a juror.
As I said, I’m no legal expert. If I was playing baseball, my average of l would be like 0.01. My thoughts on cases almost never pan out.
How much information does the defense have on jurors, and how long before selection does it receive that information?
That’s a good reason for the prosecution to participate in providing a fair trial. See, trials are meant to be about justice, and not about “social justice.”
Well, they had as much time as there was from initial jury selection, to the verdict to investigate jurors. Prior to selection it’s typically a couple days.
Right, both sides participate in jury selection. And that jury found chauvin guilty. In the eyes of the judicial system he is now guilty.
Ehh…much of that time period is sometimes referred to as “the trial.”
Is anyone denying this? Anywhere?
Right, you can bring up jury issues at any point.
Am I saying anyone is denying he is guilty in the eyes of the law? Anywhere?
How much extra time do you think the defense has during the trial?
There was no reason to say, “In the eyes of the judicial system he is now guilty,” otherwise.
Typically more than the public entity on the other side of the courtroom.
Plenty of reasons if you can look past the tip of your nose.
During a process designed to eliminate potentially biased jurors, I am sure the reason this juror was misleading in his responses was not that he would be deemed inappropriate for sitting on this case but because he really, really, really likes the legal process 
The entire reason they go through with this is to make the verdict more acceptable to both sides and avoid challenges to the verdict. Undermining that process obviously challenges that.
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Agree, but not sure how the legal rules play out here. You can argue he was obviously always going to vote guilty and that’s why he wanted to be on the jury - and like a dumbass he’s the only juror I know to identify himself publicly, I assume for the interviews.
Which frankly makes it even more suspect in my opinion - you have a bunch of jurors worried about their safety and this one guy is coming out to give interviews and get his 15 minutes.
But then there’s the fact that 11 other people also said guilty, not a hung jury. And I don’t know the threshold for reconsidering these things.
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I wish I had seen this thread earlier, while the trial was going on. I don’t know how many of you guys recognized what sort of echo chamber this was, but there are A LOT of people who believed the prosecution did their job well, that the evidence was damning, and that the end result was the right verdict. I read through this entire thread, and that point of view was never expressed.
I can tell you that I, and many people I know, were not convinced that this would be a guilty verdict pre-trial, and that the evidence presented throughout the trial WAS indeed convincing. By the end of the trial, I was left with no doubt that a guilty verdict was coming back.
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I’m not surprised by the guilty verdict. Please don’t take my speculating on possibility of retrial as me thinking he was innocent. I don’t think that at all. It really is just random speculating on the impact of venue change/juror issues being revisited, not somehow an implication I think Chauvin did no wrong.
However I’ve said earlier - and stand by this - that I actively tried to avoid the trial, its coverage, and most news about it. I long ago had my fill and really have many things I’d rather spend my time on. So I know I’m not informed as to how things went inside. I’m basically just wondering on interpretation points in MN.
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An important point here. I think the punishment fits what he did. Just not convinced on the procedural elements of this case being correct.
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