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In the United States and many other countries, with few exceptions, a unanimous decision by the jury is required in criminal cases.
That is often difficult to get. MA vs Clancy trial is an example of that. As of 1 September 2026, that 12-person jury has deliberated for more than 19 hours without being able to reach a unanimous verdict. A hung jury is definitely not what the justice system wants. It may or may not result in a retrial, with potentially the same result.
Just think how difficult it is to get any group of people to agree on something, let alone 12 jurors in a high-profile complicated trial.
Is it time to consider changing the unanimous requirement for criminal trials?
Please vote in the poll, which lists some possible alternatives, assuming a typical 12-person jury.
Note that, in some civil cases, only a majority of the 6-person jury is required.
What Girls & Guys Said
Opinion
7Opinion
Yes please! I had jury duty and the victim didn't act the usual way a person acts when they see someone with a gun, so 2 of the jury members weren't convinced that he used a gun on her
The rest of us kept telling them to look at the video.
We went frame by frame and screen shot the difference between his finger pointed at her and the gun pointed at her
Then one of them switched it up and said It could of been a cellphone
A cellphone ain't shaped like that
They made us stay extra hours and
gave in, but still stuck beside their arguments that the victim didn't act correctly
And also during the talk one of them had jury before and convicted someone wrongly so she really didn't want to say guilty. That was an eye opener because she was about to let a man get away with abusing the victim because of her own guilt and because the victim fought back instead of running away or begging. And the other person was willing to make up objects because the picture wasn't in HD.
I'm going to agree here. I've never done jury duty myself but heard enough horror stories from those who have. What's often clear is there's usually people on the jury who lack the intelligence to understand what's going on and no shortage of people who bully others into agreeing with them.
You've only got to look at attitudes to rape on this site to believe it would only take one guy not to believe the evidence because he saw a meme on Facebook. Like it or not people are biased.
Personally I think it should be a job with trained staff, particularly in complex cases. Law schools churn out huge numbers that never find work as lawyers, it would be a good job for them.
You have that bullshit in the UK too? I thought it was only an American thing. And YES! I agree, 100%
Read my answer
In the UK an unanimous decision is preferred but a judge can accept a majority verdict under certain circumstances and if he's in the right mood
I meant making random citizens serve on the jury. I thought this was only an American thing. But what you said is cool too. But sometimes the judge makes a decision based on his own principles. I remember reading a story about a nursing student who stabbed her boyfriend, and the judge dropped the charges because he didn't wanna ruin her future.
But my favorite was the judge in Italy, who let two Peruvian rapists go, on the grounds that the girl was too ugly to get raped.
YES! OMG, YESSSSSSSSS
One of my teachers was on a jury. She told us how the guy had weapons charges. Everyone voted "Guilty", except one guy. The guy was stubborn and wouldn't budge. The teacher said the other 11 changed their vote to "Not Guilty", just so they could go home, even though the guy was guilty. Unanimous system is flawed.
Juries shouldn't exist to begin with.
A judge needs to pass the bar exam to work in a court of law so do the other lawyers working the case and you mean to tell me a random who is only registered to vote gets to decide who is innocent or guilty when he or she most likely doesn't understand how evidence works nor the court system.
Makes no sense.
The correct way is there should be 3 judges and all 3 have to agree or disagree on guilt or innocence and state their reasons why the defendant is guilty or innocent.
If it was beyond a reasonable doubt then people would agree. So it must be unanimous all 12. Not by a judge.
The jury is not always right regardless. Hence the appeal process.
So it doesn't really matter.
@AviatorTom Let’s make it Unanimous, we all know that she is culpable of killing her children.
simple majoruty. the fact the perp has gotten this far through the system means he is guilty anyway
Welk they found Tupac the guy that put a hit On Tupac back in the 1990s hit man guilty just recently
The woman is mentally ill. It doesn’t matter she still did it so why should she sit in a soft little mental institution where it’s soft and she can eat cookies with people like Poppi when she should go to a hard-core prison
I want to keep it unanimous. It's just too easy for some people to get together as a sort of lynch mob otherwise.
Not for criminal trials