Before arriving at a verdict, the members of the jury review the presented evidence and study any applicable laws.
What takes place during the start of the jury’s deliberations?
Today, most jurors take notes. During the deliberations the members of the 12-person body share their notes, along with the recalled facts. During that same time period, the note-takers reexamine the exhibits.
The exhibits get taken to the room where the jurors are deliberating. Their presence in that same room helps the jury’s 12 members to gain a firmer grasp of how the injury-causing accident had happened. A judge normally gives a jury a set of instructions. Some of those relate to the starting phase of the deliberations. Most of them focus on the period of time that must follow that initial phase.
What sort of message does the judge send, when sharing the instructions?
That message concerns the aspects of the law that apply to the plaintiff’s personal injury case. Juries have to learn from the judge what actions, under the described circumstances, the law would have permitted, and which actions could have been labeled as illegal.
Judges have another message for each jury that has heard the personal injury lawyers in London arguments. Those 12 individuals are supposed to base their decision on the facts and the law, alone. None of them is supposed to feel influenced by his or her emotions.
No judge’s message can erase the questions that are bound to enter the jurors’ minds.
How would I feel if I had sustained such an injury as the result of an accident?
What sort of compensation would I expect from someone that had contributed to the creation of such an accident?
During which sorts of cases would those questions have the largest influence on each juror’s thinking?
During deliberations for the verdict in a case, where the victim/plaintiff had suffered a disabling condition or a disfigurement.
When deciding on the verdict for someone that had managed to injure a child
After having been shown a visual depiction of the challenges that the victim/plaintiff now faced: That is why some lawyers make a point of taping their client’s daily challenges. Still, juries do not like to sit thru a lengthy depiction of different challenging situations. A short piece tends to have a larger emotional impact.
After having learned about evidence that the defendant had been less than truthful, when sharing his or her version of the accident: Some defendants have tried to cover up their mistakes, so that the plaintiff’s attorney might find it difficult to prove all 4 elements of the alleged negligence.
Obviously, a case that had included 2 or more of those influential factors would really stir jurors’ emotions.