[pseudometa]

Sitting on a jury yourself should alleviate you from worries about jurors not being experts themselves. Jurors are not experts in law, yet every case they sit on the lawyers bring in people to educate the jurors on the law and all aspects that pertain to a case. It is incredibly educational sitting on a jury.

[dpark]

Jurors are not expected to actually learn anything about the law. In fact they are told that they are not deciding or interpreting the law. Juries are finders of facts and the relevant law snippets and their interpretations are given to them by the judge. (Actually if I recall correctly, my jury wasn't even given the actual law text excerpts. Just the plaintext interpretation of them.)

It can be interesting going through the process as a juror but I didn't find that I learned much about the law as a result.

[dragonwriter]

> Jurors are not expected to actually learn anything about the law

Since jury instructions both ask for a determination of whether a particular legal standard was met (phrased in legal terms), and explanation of what facts (in lay terms) the jury must find to say that that standard was met, I think your statement is not completely accurate.

[dpark]

> (phrased in legal terms)

This was not my experience. My jury was given a simplified description of the law with only relevant sections discussed.

[jartelt]

I had a similar experience. After jury selection, the trial seemed to start almost immediately and I was surprised that we were not given more background information or preparation before opening statements started. During the trial I felt like there was a lot of pressure to not ask any questions or ask for any clarifications. Even when the jury asked for a repeat of the definition of reasonable doubt, the request had to be talked about by the lawyers and the judge. Then during deliberation, we had to ask permission to view different pieces of evidence, which generally added friction to the process.

[sqeaky]

I think the system is not completely accurate.