All types of juries listed below, except for grand juries, are used in both civil proceedings and criminal proceedings.
All Types of Juries are
Listed by Category Below:
petit jury – usually consisting of 6 or 12 persons, summoned and empaneled in the trial of a specific case. — aka petty jury; trial jury; common jury; traverse jury.
Types of Juries
Used Exclusively in Criminal Proceedings:
grand jury – usually 16 to 23 people who are chosen to sit permanently for at least a month and sometimes a year and who, in ex parte proceedings, decide whether to issue indictments. — aka jury of indictment. See Title III Fed. R. Crim. P.
Types of Juries used in
Specific, Complex Cases:
special or “struck” jury – usually at a party’s request, “striking a jury” from a panel drawn specifically for an unusually important or complicated case, followed by allowing parties to alternate in striking from a list any person whom she does not wish to have on the jury.
blue-ribbon jury – consists of persons of particular advanced education or special training in order to hear a complex civil case or to sit in a grand juries.
dual juries – two separately impaneled juries for two (or two sets of) defendants in a single trial — some evidence being common to both defendants, and some not — in which each jury renders a separate verdict.
sheriff’s jury – selected and summoned by a sheriff to hold inquests for various purposes (i.e. assessing damages, ascertaining the mental condition of an alleged lunatic, or to render verdict re: ownership of personal property seized under execution).
General Descriptive Terms
for Various Types of Juries:
impartial jury – a jury that has no opinion about the case at the start of the trial and that bases its verdict on competent legal evidence.
jury of peers – a jury comprised of persons equal in status, rank, &/or character as the accused.
Jury of the Vicinage – a jury from the county (“vicinity”) where the crime occurred.
Mixed Jury – a jury composed of both men and women or persons of different races.
Foreign Jury – a jury obtained from a jurisdiction other than that in which the case is brought.
Types of Juries used
to Determine Cause of Death:
Coroner’s Jury – summoned by a coroner to make an inquiry into the cause of death of a person.
Inquest Jury – summoned by a coroner, medical examiner, sheriff, or other ministerial officer in order to determine the cause of death which involved violence or other unlawful means.
Types of Juries that Deliver
Non-Binding Verdicts:
Advisory Jury – a jury impaneled in a case in which the parties are not entitled to a jury trial as a matter of right, wherein the verdict is not binding on the case.
Shadow Jury – a group of mock jurors paid to observe a trial and report their reactions to a jury consultant hired by one of the litigants, to provide counsel with information about the jury’s likely reactions to the trial.
Summary Jury Trial (SJT) – a court-ordered settlement technique sometimes used by the federal courts in complex cases that would otherwise require a lengthy jury trial wherein which the parties argue in a mini-trial before a mock jury, generally in order to settle the case based upon the nonbinding verdict presented by the jurors.
Types of Juries used
Historically:
Homage Jury – historically, a jury in a court baron, consisting of tenants who made homage to the lord.
Jury de medietate linguae – historically, a jury comprised of half natives and half aliens, allowed when one of the parties is an alien (foreigner).
Jury of Matrons – a jury of “discreet and lawful women” impaneled to try a question of pregnancy, as when a woman sentenced to death pleads, in stay of execution, that she is pregnant, to determine if she is feigning pregnancy.