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Doctrine

Jury tampering

Criminal Law and Procedure Doctrine

Jury tampering is the crime of improperly attempting to influence how a jury is composed or how it decides a case during a trial, undermining the independence jurors are required to maintain. It can occur before a jury is seated, by working to discredit or exclude particular prospective jurors, or after jurors are sworn in, through bribery, threats or unauthorized contact meant to introduce information outside the evidence presented in court, sometimes forcing a mistrial. A more unusual form involves distributing literature about jury nullification and jurors' right to vote according to conscience, which has itself led to tampering charges in some United States jurisdictions. Historical cases include a jury foreman sentenced to three years in prison for agreeing to accept a 75,000 dollar bribe. In Great Britain, the Criminal Justice Act 2003 allows judges to order a trial to proceed without a jury when tampering has occurred or is seriously threatened, reflecting how seriously the offense is treated within the justice system.

Facts
Classification
Doctrine Category
Criminal Law 1
Connections

In Area Of Law

Entity-backed identity for the doctrine category value this doctrine already carries as an enum fact, resolved to a doctrine entity by an explicit value-to-entity map (phase 3 bucket conversion, docs\design_entity_backed_browse_buckets_20260928.md). The enum fact itself stays on the entity unchanged.

In Legal System

Source Jury Tampering (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Jury Tampering (Wikipedia)
  • Lead section
    Jury tampering is the crime of unduly attempting to influence the composition or decisions of a jury during the course of a trial.
  • In Legal System: Common Law, Lead and Criminal Justice Act 2003 section
    the Criminal Justice Act 2003 enables non-jury trials when tampering occurs
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