The Common Law in an Uncommon Courtroom: English Trials Heard by Chinese Jurors

Abstract

Trial by jury is a key institution in the common law system. The introduction of lay persons into the judicial process, however, gives cause for concern about jurors’ comprehension of legal language. Studies in jury comprehension have been largely carried out in monolingual legal systems where jurors speak English as their native language or English operates as a societal lingua franca. These studies have focused on jurors’ ability to understand legalese or to follow and evaluate highly technical and scientific evidence given by expert witnesses (Charrow & Charrow, 1979; Findlay, 2008; Schutz, 1997; Steele & Thornburg, 1988; Trimboli, 2008; Vidmar, 2001). This paper discusses the issue of jury comprehension in the unique context of Hong Kong courts, where English-medium trials are argued before Chinese jurors who speak English as a second or even foreign language. The pool of potential jurors is dominated by Hong Kong Chinese who have Cantonese as their first language. Until now, only one survey conducted in the early 1990s (Duff et al, 1992) has shed light on this issue. Drawing on the recordings of two jury trials from the High Court, and one Appellate Court judgment quashing a jury verdict, the present study provides further empirical evidence supporting claims about jurors’ comprehension problem. Failure to address this problem jeopardises not just the administration of justice, but the very survival of the jury system in Hong Kong. This paper proposes ways to improve jurors’ access to legal speeches in particular and the entire trial in general in order to help them return a more soundly based verdict.