Georgia: 12 Angry Men, Georgian-Style

It was the umpteenth take in the television taping of a mock trial by jury, and patience was wearing thin. Twelve Georgian jurors were charged with deciding the guilt of a man charged with killing his wife. And the jurors were deadlocked on the verdict.

"I think that the defendant is guilty, but I don't want to send him to jail for who knows how long," declared one middle-aged man.

"Are you suggesting that we let him go and let him kill again?" retorted a woman, as the dissenting juror jumped to his feet.

"Why is the government putting it on us to decide what this man deserves?" fumed a silver-haired philosophy professor, gesticulating wildly. "Doesn't the government want do anything anymore? What's next? Will ordinary citizens also be required to chase criminals in the streets?"

Opinion surveys repeatedly put the judiciary system as one of Georgians' least trusted institutions; human rights groups charge that the courts pander to the executive branch. Now, the Georgian government believes that instituting trials by jury would be a way to improve the judicial system's image. Prime Minister Nika Gilauri has made establishing jury trials one of his cabinet's top priorities.

Later this spring, parliament is expected to sign into law an amendment to the Criminal Procedures Code that would establish trial by jury for criminal cases. An implementation timeline is not yet available, but jury boxes are already in place in Tbilisi city courts.

The reform, though, will not be nationwide -- at least, initially. Jury trials will be confined to the capital for an undefined start-up period.

The proposed system is fashioned after the traditional Anglo-Saxon model. The 12-member jury must reach a unanimous verdict, but the judge retains sole responsibility for deciding sentences. Defense counsel, prosecutors and judges will be able to eliminate proposed jurors. Politicians, psychologists, convicts, priests, soldiers, Interior Ministry personnel and employees of the General Prosecutor Office will be barred from serving as jurors.

But in a country with little experience of public control over the justice system, the responsibility of rendering verdicts sometimes seems too great. As Rustavi-2 television's July 2008 mock trial by jury suggested, deciding a person's guilt or innocence is a burden many Georgians would prefer to see rest with someone else.

"There is absolutely no way I'm going to send somebody to prison," said Nika Grdzelidze, a 25-year-old Tbilisi arts academy student. "Professional lawyers and investigators should be doing that." Rather than respond to a summons for jury duty, Grdzelidze says he would rather pay a fine.

Others say that in a country with closely-knit family networks, keeping a jury immune from outside pressures could prove a tall order. "Georgia is a country with a strong and elaborate system of kinship and cronyism, so the likelihood of biased or socially dictated decisions by jurors is high," commented legal analyst Gigla Abulashvili, who served as an advisor to parliament for the trial-by-jury draft law.

"But the same is true for a judge," countered Tbilisi actress Sano Dzadzamia, who says she would be happy to serve on a jury. "It is not going to be easy, but if I'm presented with good evidence, I will make my decision and ignore any attempts to influence my judgment," Dzadzamia said.

As presently constructed, the proposed legislation does not contain a provision for sequestering jurors for an especially high-profile trial. The option was "discarded as too costly," said Abulashvili, the legal expert.

For Abulashvili, that means that trial by jury in Georgia is doomed to fall short of its goal. "It's a noble effort gone bad," Abulashvili commented. "In the beginning, I welcomed the project, but now I think it's headed in the wrong direction."

Georgia has had scant prior experience with the use of juries. In the mid-19th century, Russian Tsar Alexander II provided for a jury system to foster respect for the law throughout the Russian Empire, a territory that then included Georgia. The concept was thrown out after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution.

Ombudsman Sozar Subari, though, notes that a form of trial by jury already exists in Svaneti, a remote mountain territory in northern Georgia. Svan communities often select three individuals of high repute to resolve civil disputes and, sometimes, crimes. The jurors, the parties in dispute and witnesses take a vow on icons to accept the ruling of the informal tribunal.

Subari welcomes the idea of a jury system, saying that it will enhance the participation of civil society in the implementation of justice. But Subari believes that political will be crucial if the judicial experiment is to succeed. "Unless the executive branch comes to a point when it truly lets go of the judiciary [branch], any reform, including trial by jury, would be an exercise in futility," Subari said.

Still, faced with a court system that inspires more derision than respect, some Georgians are willing to take the chance. Said Dzadzamia; "It will be difficult at first, just as any innovation is, but I'm sure in the long run it's going to work."