Chief Justice, the Problem Is Not the Jury

Chief Justice Yamie Quiqui Gbeisay Sr. wants to end jury trials because jurors are being bribed and tampered with. But report after report, at home and abroad, has found the same rot on the bench. Taking the verdict away from twelve citizens and handing it to one judge would not end corruption in our courts. It would concentrate it. The call is wrong, and the Legislature should reject it.

THE CHIEF JUSTICE is right about one thing: jury tampering is real. Anyone who has followed a high-profile trial in Monrovia has heard the whispers of jurors reached, paid or pressured. When he used the opening of the Supreme Court’s October term to say that such practices threaten fair trials and public confidence, he was naming a genuine problem.

BUT HIS CURE is worse than the disease. Abolishing jury trials, with President Joseph Boakai and senior officials looking on, would take power from ordinary citizens and give it to the one part of the system that has the least public trust: the judges themselves.

THE EVIDENCE IS not rumor. It is the consistent finding of international observers for more than a decade.

THE U.S. STATE Department’s most recent human rights report on Liberia states that “the government generally did not respect judicial independence and impartiality.” It says judges “reportedly solicited bribes to try cases, grant bail to detainees, award damages in civil cases,” and to acquit defendants. It also notes that “the outcome of some trials appeared to be predetermined,” especially when the accused were politically connected or socially prominent.

THE BERTELSMANN TRANSFORMATION Index, a German assessment of governance in developing countries, has described Liberia’s justice system in the same terms. “Corruption of judges and juries constitutes a major obstacle to fair and transparent trials,” it found. Note the order of those words: judges first. The same index observed that “corruption is endemic despite salary hikes for judges and magistrates.”

THE NORWEGIAN-BASED U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre describes a judiciary that is “formally independent but characterised by severe functional deficits.” It says judges and magistrates are “reportedly subject to undue influence from the private sector and government officials.” It also finds that the bodies meant to discipline erring judges, the Judicial Inquiry Commission and the Grievance and Ethics Committee, “lack appropriate guidelines to deliver their mandates effectively.”

LIBERIANS THEMSELVES AGREE. In Afrobarometer’s latest survey, 52 percent of citizens said most or all judges and magistrates are corrupt. That is a majority of the public declaring no confidence in the very officials the Chief Justice would now make sole deciders of guilt and innocence.

SO WE ASK: if jurors can be bought, what makes a judge harder to buy? The arithmetic runs the other way. To fix a jury verdict, a corrupt party must reach several citizens drawn at random, who meet once, then go home. To fix a judge-alone verdict, they must reach one official who sits on the same bench, case after case, year after year. Corruption becomes cheaper, quieter and more durable.

THE JURY IS also one of the few places where ordinary Liberians hold real power in the justice system. It is the community’s conscience in the courtroom. Take it away, and the poor man in the dock faces the state, and whatever pressures the state can bring, with no one from his own community between them.

THERE IS ALSO the matter of law. The right to trial by jury is written into Article 21(h) of our Constitution. It cannot be repealed by a speech or a judicial directive. It would require a constitutional amendment approved by the people in a referendum, and we doubt Liberians will vote to surrender it.

WE HAVE SEEN this year how quickly jury disputes become political. In the Capitol Building arson trial, an entire jury panel was dissolved mid-trial at the prosecution’s request, and the case is now stalled before the Supreme Court. That episode exposed weaknesses in how juries are selected, managed and protected. It did not prove that judges alone would do better.

IF THE CHIEF Justice wants to restore confidence in the courts, there is a reform agenda waiting for him:

• Protect jurors in sensitive trials through sequestration, anonymity and fair pay.

• Prosecute those who bribe jurors, not only the jurors who take the money.

• Require judges to declare their assets publicly and submit to lifestyle audits.

• Give the Judicial Inquiry Commission teeth, and publish its findings.

• Assign cases at random, so no judge is hand-picked for a politically sensitive trial.

• Open courtrooms to independent monitors and publish transcripts.

NONE OF THESE requires amending the Constitution. All of them would strengthen the integrity of the system the Chief Justice says he wants to protect.

THE JUDICIARY CANNOT credibly ask the public to trust judges more while international reports, and the public’s own verdict, say they deserve to be trusted less. Clean up the bench first. Then let us talk about the jury.

UNTIL THEN, CHIEF Justice, the answer is no.