9 ms·

Right but isn't the whole issue we have with white people walking free after crimes while black people face the actual punishment all because of this exact issu

• pooper 4y ago
  > White college girl has weed, jury nullifies. Black unemployed guy has weed, jail. I replied elsewhere but to tl;Dr what currently happens is: White college girl has weed, no charges pressed.
  • shadowgovt 4y ago
    No charges pressed because jury will nullify; it's a cycle. Jury nullification, of a sort, actually dates back to England. One of the pressures that diminished the penalties for theft (which had crept up to "death") was that juries, seeing a young man in the box with their whole life ahead of them whose only crime was taking from some unaccountable rich boffin, found themselves unwilling to toss the man in the gallows for taking from one who had plenty. Upon seeing this pattern emerge, the London merchant class panicked and petitioned the king to lower the penalty, lest no crimes against them be punished at all.