[d0de]

I think it would be near impossible for someone who has passed the patent bar to genuinely set aside their "specialized knowledge" when hearing a patent case. In fact, I will flat-out assert that it's impossible, because when you become a domain expert in that way, you internalize a great deal of the training. If one side flubs an explanation of prior art or of some other term of art, the rest of the jury may be confused or be under a misapprehension and the patent attorney will not be. You'd have to be both unusually self aware and a saint to i) recognize the misapprehension you would be under in that situation if you didn't have domain knowledge, and ii) try to reach a decision as if you were under that misapprehension.

In other words, I think it's a complete fiction to tell people to set aside professional training and the knowledge and background that comes with that when they're acting as a jury member. If you were hearing a civil case involving programming, would you be able to set aside your knowledge of programming and hear the case as if you were a layperson? I wouldn't.

[alttag]

Not only do I agree, I'd take it a step further: the jurors should be expected to use their specialized knowledge. Yes, they should rely primarily on what's presented, but the application of knowledge is important. Yes, there may be instances where a jury foreman misinterprets the law, but that can happen anyway, so why attempt to enforce the unenforceable and pretend domain knowledge isn't important or useful?

[saraid216]

> Yes, there may be instances where a jury foreman misinterprets the law, but that can happen anyway, so why attempt to enforce the unenforceable and pretend domain knowledge isn't important or useful?

It's not really that domain knowledge isn't important or useful; it's that this isn't the place for it. If you have domain knowledge, its inclusion is meant to contribute to the process at the point of legislation, not the point of interpretation. If your domain knowledge disagrees with the law, then you should get the law changed, not misinterpreted.

If, like in Apple vs. Samsung, one juror has specialized knowledge and uses that to act as an authority, he's basically disemboweling the entire point of three branches of government, each disarming each other. He ignores the law, chooses his own interpretation, and gets it executed. If that's not clear, this is the "judge, jury, and executioner" powers vested in a single person.

[adgar]

> Yes, there may be instances where a jury foreman misinterprets the law, but that can happen anyway, so why attempt to enforce the unenforceable and pretend domain knowledge isn't important or useful?

The point of forbidding juror's own personal ideas about the law from the jury room, as you suggest people must do, is to reduce the likelihood that people screw it up. So there are less instances of this happening.

You're somehow arguing that the foreman's error, based on his own beliefs, is evidence of what already happens anyway (we can't do any better) and thus extrapolating that people should use their beliefs more.

Why don't we spend a little more energy and time teaching jurors how to read jury instructions? Teaching them to be confident enough with that reading to challenge bullshit like the foreman here presented? Make them better jurors, not just throw our hands up and say "use whatever you want when you deliberate, the trial was just for fun anyway."