Selecting a Jury

Juries of six or twelve people are selected from a jury pool.  Depending on the case, six jurors or 12 jurors can be used.  Usually twelve people from the jury pool are called in by the court clerk; they are then asked if there is any reason why they can't serve.  After this the judge and lawyers are able to ask the people questions about whether they have any knowledge of the case or if they have personal experiences that might bias their judgment in this case.  After the questioning a lawyer can ask the judge to dismiss a juror because of bias toward the case.  The judge makes the final decision about dismissing the juror or not.  When both lawyers agree on a jury, the jurors are sworn in and then the trial starts.  Jurors are supposed to listen to evidence during a trial and decide if the person on trial is guilty or not.  This website is very informative.  Besides how a jury is selected the website has links to all the different parts of a trial.  Some of these links include motions, bringing charges, plea bargaining, opening statements, evidence, mistrials, jury deliberation and appeals.  I learned a lot about the court system through this website.

Here is the website:

http://www.abanet.org/publiced/courts/juryselect.html