Minister welcomes back bill to improve juror safety

Justice Minister Simon Power today welcomed the Law and Order Select Committee’s report on a bill which focuses on tightening juror privacy, safety, and security.

The Juries (Jury Service and Protection of Particulars of Jury List Information) Amendment Bill increases security for potential jurors by removing their addresses from jury panel lists and preventing the accused from ever having access to it.

It comes after a self-represented litigant corresponded with people whose names and addresses were on the jury panel list for his trial.

Under the bill, the prosecution, defence, court-appointed advisers to defendants representing themselves, and Police employees who are not personally or closely connected with the facts or parties in the case, can access the address information on request.

The bill also provides that the registrar must permanently excuse people aged 65 and over from serving on a jury if they request it in writing.

“The committee made it clear that the bill does not propose to re-introduce an age limit for jury service and that those aged 65 and over will retain all the rights they currently have in relation to serving on a jury,” Mr Power said.

“The amendment is simply designed to allow people over 65 who no longer wish to be called for jury service to make one request to be permanently excused, as opposed to having the added inconvenience of making a separate request each time they are summonsed.

“I want to make it clear that the Government values the contribution that people over 65, with their considerable life experience, bring to this important civic duty.”

The bill also:

• Bars people from serving on a jury if they have, in the previous five years, been sentenced to home detention for three months or more. This provision puts them in the same category as those sentenced to a short term of imprisonment.
• Ensures that offenders who are serving a sentence of less than three months’ home detention be excused from jury service, or allowed to defer their attendance, until their sentence is complete.
• Gives registrars the power to grant a person permanent excusal from serving on a jury on the grounds of disability or chronic health problems.

The Select Committee’s report can be found here. The Cabinet paper is available here.