Law in fiction: acquittal of Moriarty in *Sherlock* TV series [clarification: I'm posting this question here because it is arguably a better forum than scifi.SE] In "The Reichenbach Fall" (Sherlock season 2, episode 3), Jim Moriarty breaks into the Jewel House at the Tower of London, the vault of the Bank of England, and Pentonville Prison. Of relevance here is the fact that he wants to get caught in the act (e.g., he deliberately stands unmasked in front of security camera, and then waits for the police to find him inside the locked-down Jewel House, sitting on the throne and wearing the Crown Jewels). At his trial, however, the jury unanimously finds him not guilty, and he walks free, much to everybody's surprise. Shortly after, he reveals to Holmes that the jurors declared him not guilty because he had his minions threaten them and their families with death and other horrible consequences, should they find him guilty. The whole chain of events is Moriarty's way of showing Holmes and Watson that he is beyond the reach of ordinary justice. Question: in UK law, is the judge obliged to accept the jury's not-guilty verdict, even in cases where the defendant is so obviously guilty as in this episode? More precisely, does the judge have the power to ignore the jury's verdict (on the grounds that the verdict is inherently incompatible with the available evidence) and start a retrial with a different jury? This question, of course, presupposes that the judge either hasn't been threatened or has decided to maintain his/her integrity in the face of threats.
Currently, following Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996 sections 54-57, the court can certify that interference or intimidation has resulted in acquittal, in which case the acquittal can be set aside.
As I understand the story, Black recused himself because the attorney was his cousin. I think the joke is that the attorney thought it wasn't necessary for Black to do so, perhaps because the attorney didn't understand how seriously conflicts of interest are taken. I don't think Kennedy misspoke; I think he's just used the generic you construct, in which "you" is used as an impersonal pronoun instead of "one". His sentence could be rephrased more formally as: Hugo Black stands up and stalks out of the room, which among Supreme Court justices is a polite way to say that one is recused. In other words, Black's action is equivalent to him saying "I am recused".
Because it's explicitly a jury of your peers That is, every person is entitled to have their guilt or innocence decided by people &quot;like them&quot; - not kings, lords or, heaven forbid, lawyers. The jury doesn't need to know the law and indeed, in many jurisdictions, lawyers are explicitly disqualified from jury service (hint: if you want to avoid jury service, get a law degree). The role of the jury is to decide the facts - what happened and whether that meets the prosecution's burden of proof. The jury is told what the law is by the judge - that's their job. Most law shows on TV skip over the very important role of the judge's instructions to the jury. These usually go along the lines of (greatly abridged and paraphrased) &quot;If you decide that X, Y &amp; Z are true then you must return a guilty verdict but if any of them are not true you must return not guilty.&quot; A very brief potted history of the jury system is contained in this answer: Why 12 Jurors, why not 11, 10, 9, 1? Now, this is, according to those from common law traditions, the great truth and beauty of the jury system. To those from civil, sharia and other legal traditions: it's just stupid.
Unless there is enough evidence to convict one or more of the suspects, none will be convicted. In general the argument: We know it must be one of you, but we don't know whch, so we find you all guilty. is not allowed in any non-dictatorial jurisdiction. Just how much evidence is needed for a conviction varies by jurisdiction in theory, and by judge or jury in practice. Also, it would be possible to charge several of the residents with having acted jointly in the crime, but there would still need to be sufficient evidence against each defendant to obtain a conviction.
Yes It's not uncommon. In fact I am aware of at least one case where the trial judge referred it to appeal before he made his decision on the basis that whichever way he decided the law was so unsettled that grounds for appeal would occur. In that case the court of appeal called up the trial judge to sit on the 3 judge appeal a) because he knew the case and b) because you don't get to not make a decision because it's hard sonny-jim.
I don't believe it is contradictory. Some kinds of injury are inherently difficult to calculate (e.g. damage to reputation caused by slander) but the judge or jury, as the case may be, will review the evidence and do the best they can. Lord Reed says as much in paragraph 38 of his judgment. ... and as a practical matter, it appears the damages, in this case, were both calculable and supported by evidence. The Court's primary focus was not whether damages could be calculated but rather the measure of damages (i.e. the method of calculation).
In the first case, under US law, you are not considered guilty in most cases where you are forced to commit a crime under duress (gun to your head would certainly qualify). Murder is a rare exception to this rule, and the patron can be tried for the murder of the prostitute. Given the nature of Doe, who uses situations of duress to force a no win scenario for his victims, a good defense would likely work to get Jury Nullification of this crime, given the circumstance. The likely defense would be to validate that the man would not ordinarily kill a prostitute and thus only under a situation such as the one presented would he. It is still a crime, but the jury could choose not to convict, but it's a gamble as the law of crime of duress is likely to come up in the course of the trial. Situation 2 is a little more grim, as in this case, Doe has already surrendered and is custody and admits to a crime that is personal to the detective. I haven't seen the movie, so I can't suggest if there was an appropriate time for Mills to be pulled from the case prior to this revelation, but if such an opportunity happened, he should have. Since Doe is not threatening Mills at the point of time and he had already carried out his crime and been captured, Mills is an officer of the law who is killing someone in his custody. This is a crime and should be prosecuted. The circumstances might serve as mitigating factors and the jury may nullify, but these are circumstances that are less likely than the above case. Mills is also the lead detective in this case (?), and thus should know how Doe functions and what he is trying to get done. In the role of prosecutor, I personally would not push the crime against the patron as the likely jury would be too sympathetic to the defense. I would prosecute Mills as his responsibilities as a law enforcer and his training would have made him well aware that what he did was a crime.
Bob will be convicted if he is found guilty beyond reasonable doubt. Now it is a logical fact that he cannot be guilty of both crimes, but it is entirely possible that his first conviction was incorrect and he is guilty of murder. His defense would point out that the first conviction creates reasonable doubt about his guilt in the murder case. The prosecution would have to show how it doesn't, for example by finding a police officer who forged the evidence in the first case. And then the defence would point out that the fact that evidence against Bob was forged once means reasonable doubt for the evidence in the second case. Fact is, the prosecution must show guilt beyond reasonable doubt for the murder, and the fact that Bob was found guilty beyond reasonable doubt for a different crime, and that he cannot have committed both crimes, makes the prosecutions task a lot harder. Now what if the prosecution finds a second criminal who is an exact visual match for Bob? On the positive side, this would explain how there are two videos apparently showing Bob committing two crimes in different places. It would put the prosecution into the difficult position to have to prove which one is the murderer. And they can't say &quot;Bob is in jail already, so it must have been Bill&quot;, because now Bob's first conviction looks very unsafe.