Every seat was taken inside a Jefferson County courtroom on Wednesday afternoon, as loved ones of a cyclist hit and killed last year attended the sentencing hearing for the man who was driving.
In most cases like this the prosecutors don’t even charge the driver because they know the jury will be full of drivers, not cyclists, and it will be impossible to get a conviction anyway. This guy pleaded guilty for some reason but usually the jurors will think “I’m a driver and I may be a similar situation some day. I wouldn’t like to go to jail for something like that”.
I feel like if someone did a killing with their car and was let off, and someone enacted vigilante justice of their own, I wouldn’t vote to convict.
In most cases like this the prosecutors don’t even charge the driver because they know the jury will be full of drivers, not cyclists, and it will be impossible to get a conviction anyway. This guy pleaded guilty for some reason but usually the jurors will think “I’m a driver and I may be a similar situation some day. I wouldn’t like to go to jail for something like that”.
Jury nullification cuts both ways.
The family asked for a few days in jail.