black woman get killed in Police Custody

[RDKirk]

There's a difference between how a jury consider police testimony with how the testimony is supposed to be treated. The jury instructions I am familiar with (PA's instructions are similar to what was posted from CT) have always made it clear that a police officer's testimony is supposed to be considered the same as any other witness. Whether that actually happens in the reality of a jury is a different issue all together. I would bet that on a whole, jurors tend to believe a cop over any other witness. That's a cultural thing and I'm sure that both prosecutors and defense attorneys are aware of this and are going to try and eliminate jurors accordingly based on the answer to that question. I'd expect defense attorneys look at the question more so than prosecutors since people are likely to subconsciously inherently believe the cop despite saying they won't.

I've been on a jury in which precisely the opposite happened--it was a matter of how the jurors personally perceived the honesty of police officers. I had clearly noted the attempts by the attorneys during the jury selection to prevent those extremes, but the three former 60s radical women were at that time in their 50s and looked like Aunt Bee...they slipped through the process.

But it's definitely a point that people rarely perceive the testimony of police officers equal to that of private citizens.

 

[RDKirk]

Size does matter, but I don't think it matters as much as you'd think. It says something that my karate sensei was 5'8, and easily overwhelmed the 6'2 guy at my club using just technique. My current Jeet Kune Do club is run by a 5'7 guy, and his technique is such that the 6'1 guys there don't stand a chance.

Supercloud said: "I've stated numerous times that size is not the only variable but it is an important one."

What you've said is that a men with the advantage of multiple martial arts black belts and dozens of more years of specialized fighting experience can overcome the advantage of size. That hardly proves Supercloud wrong.

 

[SuperCloud]

Supercloud said: "I've stated numerous times that size is not the only variable but it is an important one."

What you've said is that a men with the advantage of multiple martial arts black belts and dozens of more years of specialized fighting experience can overcome the advantage of size. That hardly proves Supercloud wrong.

Thank you.

I've had smaller women than myself--one a 14 year-old girl--out class me in boxing drills between us with her speed, accuracy, and body movement. Just technique I guess. All of them had, due to better training and longer term training than myself, "a pack to their punch" so to speak. Solid punches that gave the impression a man or older teen boy was hitting you. But that said... I don't think their punches, even with my inferior technique and inferior skill level, carried as much power as mine. And consider I'm a smaller man. Plus, my body could easily handle their punches. But this bigger, stocky (kind of "heavy set" actually), white man that looked as if he may have weighed over 200 lbs? That dudes power in his punches were impressive and awing to me just hitting my hands covered in boxing pads.

 

[bhsmte]

I've been on a jury in which precisely the opposite happened--it was a matter of how the jurors personally perceived the honesty of police officers. I had clearly noted the attempts by the attorneys during the jury selection to prevent those extremes, but the three former 60s radical women were at that time in their 50s and looked like Aunt Bee...they slipped through the process.

But it's definitely a point that people rarely perceive the testimony of police officers equal to that of private citizens.

Correct, the makeup of the jury is crucial.

Take the OJ case for instance. Despite the mountains of evidence against OJ, the jury bought the notion the cops were corrupt and the evidence was not reliable.

 

[RDKirk]

Correct, the makeup of the jury is crucial.

Take the OJ case for instance. Despite the mountains of evidence against OJ, the jury bought the notion the cops were corrupt and the evidence was not reliable.

Well, as it was revealed later, the LA public had ample reason to believe the LAPD was corrupt.

 

[bhsmte]

Well, as it was revealed later, the LA public had ample reason to believe the LAPD was corrupt.

To a degree, all police forces have a level of corruption and especially so, the larger ones.

What I am referring more to, was the actual content and amount of evidence that one would need to believe was all tainted, to find OJ not guilty. Don't know if you ever read the book by Bugliosi about the trial and the evidence, but it was a good one.

Bottom line, if the OJ trial was held where it was originally meant to be held, the jury makeup would have been far different. But, when the trial was moved downtown, that drastically changed the potential jury makeup.

Furthermore, the verdict, was also payback from the Rodney King verdict, which was fresh in the minds of that particular jury.