defining reasonable doubt - andrea

defining reasonable doubt

Excerpt:

Reasonable Doubt. Sounds simple enough, right? In truth, it can be a tough burden.

I was browsing through the court filings in this case – www.ninthcircuit.org - and came across a Defense motion that objects to the use of the standard Florida jury instruction with regards to reasonable doubt. It was very interesting. Here’s the link to the defense document: WRITTEN OBJECTION TO THE STANDARD JURY INSTRUCTION ON REASONABLE DOUBT

This motion, written by Andrea Lyon and Jose Baez, opposes the standard definition of reasonable doubt. The defense supplies its proposed verbiage to instruct the jury on reasonable doubt for both the Guilt Phase and the Penalty Phase of the trial and its aftermath.

Before discussing Florida’s definition of Reasonable Doubt, I want to include the definition of reasonable and doubt from my American Version of the Oxford Dictionary to see how we fare in our understanding of the words.

READ MORE: http://andreadreamin.com/2011/04/18/defining-reasonable-doubt/