MINNETONKA, Minn. — Last week in the Star Tribune's opinion column, a case against the 12-person jury was made.
"Most European countries have a panel of judges who are looking at cases, and they got away with lay juries in the 20th century," Schroeder said last Tuesday.
However, this week, retired US. District judge for Minnesota, James Rosenbaum defended the jury trial system that's centuries old, in a response opinion piece published in the Star Tribune.
"It reflects a great deal of confidence in the citizenry," Judge Rosenbaum said.
He said he's aware that not everyone is in a position to take leaves from work and home life for their civic duty. When it comes to the question of fairness, he called it a serious one.
"The federal system I think pays $35 to $40 a day," he said. "The state system pays $15 to $20 and that's terrible. That's the legislature and requests are made regularly to try to compensate people."
When asked if excluding that pool of people was fair, he retorted by asking, "Who else are we going to get?"
"These are human beings, they bring their experience, they bring their life, they bring what they know about people and how they live and what they do, and how they operate under pressure," Judge Rosenbaum said. "I think that's the kind of thing-- that the alternative is what? I'll take the one we've got."
Judge Rosenbaum also reflected on the times he disagreed with a jury.
"I thought a couple times a jury made mistakes," he said. "I sat for 25 years. Remember 12 people agreed, and there's a high probability that 12 people make a wiser decision than I. A couple of times I did disagree. I will tell you the court of appeals reversed me on matters I did way more than I thought the jury was wrong."
Judge Rosenbaum also added that from his experience, jurors, once they are selected, try their hardest to take the case seriously and impartially.
"It's an imperfect process because humans are imperfect, but for all its flaws, it has done an remarkable job for almost 800 years," he said. "This belief that there's some form of perfection that we ought to do, if there is, let's do it, but so far I haven't really seen one."