Toasticle posted:

It baffles me that there are usually lawyers saying jury nullification unravels the judicial system but it's ok for a DA to do essentially the same thing. I mentioned I was the office manager for a law firm in Miami and there was a defense attorney there, very passionate guy. In his opinion the system is supposed to have a group of your peers at the start and at the very end as a check against not only malicious prosecution but against unjust laws. The GJ as a check against the justice system unfairly prosecuting for personal and political reasons and nullification as a check against unjust laws. He felt the GJ should have both the DA and the persons attorney there to ensure no facts are left out and that what is presented is made clear between "This is what we know" and "This is what we think" and if the defense should be able to have a judge rule if he feels the DA is pesenting bad evidence or otherwise being biased.

Maybe it's over the top but he argued regular citizens deciding whether someone may have done something to warrant a trial and the final decision as to guilty or innocent made by regular citizens with no restrictions (in that they can refuse to indict and nullify) was a check against government tyranny. Like an said, he was passionate.

I can't justify in my head that a single person has the power to let someone go because he just can is working as intended but I couldn't get a lawyer to say that nullification was allowed without a multi paragraph explanation as to why it undermines the foundations of the system. The DA has the authority no matter how damning the evidence to just go "nope" or if pressured into it can present it any way he wants and there's no check to his decisions but a trial jurist doing the same thing, something they are allowed to do, is a danger to the system itself.