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1 I’ve read Prof Cheryl Thomas’s new paper on jurors. I have a few thoughts. It’s the first ever study in England and Wales to examine the attitudes of real jurors. Her research is not just about attitudes to rape - it has a wider scope. Here, I focus on the rape myth findings.
2 Just before I start - when some brief findings from this work were discussed on Radio 4 last year it set off a bit of a SM firestorm.
3 Some rather unpleasant & totally unacceptable things were said about Prof Thomas and her work. It was very disappointing to see such a reaction and if it happens on my timeline again I’ll simply block people.
4 There is no question this is important work carried out by a scholar who has done previous real jury research. See eg https://www.justice.gov.uk/downloads/publications/research-and-analysis/moj-research/are-juries-fair-research.pdf
5 Methodology -
The research was ‘conducted through an anonymous and voluntary survey of actual juries’, comprising 771 jurors from 65 discharged juries in 4 court regions with a 99% participation rate.
The research was ‘conducted through an anonymous and voluntary survey of actual juries’, comprising 771 jurors from 65 discharged juries in 4 court regions with a 99% participation rate.
6 Not all the jurors served on juries that heard sex offence cases, but since this isn’t a study of the jury room I don’t think it matters. The point is that the study participants were called for jury service, and any of them could have sat on a jury in a sex offence case.
7 Initially, Thomas discusses 7 myths/stereotypes eg ‘a rape probably didn’t happen if the victim has no bruises or marks’; ‘if a person doesn’t physically fight back, you can’t really say it was rape’, ‘it is difficult to believe rape allegs that were not reported immediately’
8 There were also statements that involved victim blaming eg references to a victim’s clothing. Participants were asked to agree, disagree or indicate that they were not sure.
9 I think the inclusion of ‘not sure’ is important because we not only need to know the no. of jurors who believe in myths but whether there are significant numbers jurors in need of further guidance on particular topics because they are unsure.
10 Back to the findings - The jurors who agreed with the 7 myths/stereotypes were low in number (between 2 and 7 percent), with 73-92% disagreeing and 6-20% were not sure.
11 Thomas contrasts her findings on injury/resistance with an opinion poll that found a much higher rate of belief in these myths. Thomas argues ‘public opinion polls cannot be a proxy for what real jurors believe’.
12 That seems a fair point to me. There is a lot of sloppiness in the way findings from attitude surveys and opinion polls are readily assumed to impact juror and wider criminal justice decision making.
13 Three further questions were asked pertaining to juror recognition that a victim may be reluctant to disclose rape, disclosure of rape within a relationship may take a long time and that giving evidence in court is hard.
14 Again, most jurors (77-80%) agreed that victims maybe reluctant to report etc. Few disagreed (4-7%) with 13-19% not sure.
15 Jurors gave more mixed results concerning an expectation that when giving evidence a rape victim would be ‘very emotional’ - 43% agreed, 22% disagreed and 35% were not sure.
16 Only 5% thought a person was more likely to be raped by a stranger than someone they know, 31% were unsure and 64% disagreed. There are other findings but I move on.
17 Thomas concludes by arguing that jurors should be given the ‘best guidance to understand cases’. Specifically, to deal with beliefs around ‘stranger vs acquaintance rape and emotion when giving evidence’.
18 Thomas points out that those jurors who believed in myths ‘amounted to less than one person on any jury’. That is much less than I expected to see. But does that mean everything is okay in the jury room?
19 One issue is the number of ‘not sure’ jurors on some questions. During real jury deliberations, could ‘not sure’ jurors be swayed by a single juror using myths or stereotypes? It’s speculation on my part but the mock jury research should give pause for thought.
20 For example, the excellent research by Louise Ellison and @VMunro_Law with its insights into the interplay of factors that influence mock jury decisions offers important perspective. As do their findings on mock juror use of directions.
21 To sum up, I think this new research is an important addition to the existing literature. It doesn’t take it us into the jury room but it does help us understand the attitudes of actual jurors. This is innovative and important. As with every study, it has limitations.
22 It’s perfectly possible to design a methodology similar to one used in many mock jury studies but legal impediments make such a study of actual juries impossible. Until that changes we work with what we have, including the mock jury research & this latest study.
