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The impact of pre-trial publicity relating to mental illness on juror decision making

Introduction

In the UK courts members of the public can have a role in deciding the outcome of a criminal trial by serving on a jury. The defendant in the case is entitled to a fair trial and members of the jury are required to jointly reach a verdict based only on the facts of the case. Media coverage is restricted during an active trial to help achieve these aims. However, jurors might be exposed to media coverage of the crime or the defendant before the trial begins. This could include negative information about the defendant that does not meet the standard required of evidence in court (Bakhshay and Haney, 2018). If this pretrial publicity influences the jury's decision making, it has the potential to undermine the defendant's right to a fair trial.

Previous research using mock trial experiments suggests that pretrial publicity can bias the decisions of jurors and juries sufficiently to affect the outcome of a trial (e.g. Hoetger et al., 2022; Steblay et al., 1999). For example,Ruva, Guenther and Yarbrough (2011) presented participants with either positive pre-trial publicity, negative pre-trial publicity or unrelated pre-trial publicity, in the form of newspaper articles. Participants then took on the role of jurors by viewing a video of a real trial and were asked to provide a verdict (guilty or not guilty). Results revealed that positive pre-trial publicity led to a greater frequency of innocent verdicts. Conversely, negative pre-trial publicity was associated with a greater frequency of guilty verdicts.

Perception of defendant criminality and pre-trial guilt can also be affected by stereotypes and stigmatised views (Daftary-Kapur, Dumas andPenrod, 2010). This may impact defendants with a mental health diagnosis, who are typically considered to be more violent than individuals without mental illness, despite research to the contrary (Link et al, 1999). This was investigated by Mossiere and Maeder (2015) who measured mock juror attitudes to mental illness in a sample of psychology students and in a community sample. Attitude towards mental illness was measured before participants read a transcript of a robbery trial. The defendant was either described as having no mental illness, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, depression, or suffering from substance abuse. The results showed that regardless of whether participants were in the student or community sample, neither attitude nor type of mental illness affected their verdict. In other words, the presence of a mental illness, and the type of illness, did not lead to more guilty verdicts.

While Mossiere and Maeder (2015) did not find an effect of mental illness on verdict, they did not focus specifically on pretrial publicity.Previous research has found that stereotyped views of mental illness can affect ratings of competence and propensity to violence (Pescosolido et al,1999) and media portrayals of defendants tend to be negative (Bakhshay and Haney, 2018) so it would be valuable to understand the impact of pre-trial publicity relating to defendants with mental illnesses. This study brings together the findings of Ruva et al (2011) and Mossiere and Maeder (2015) to investigate whether exposure to pretrial publicity about a defendant's mental illness affects mock juror verdicts using an experimental approach. Participants will be exposed to either pretrial publicity which mentions mental illness or pretrial publicity which has no mention of mental illness. It is predicted that that there will be a difference in verdict depending on whether participants are exposed to pretrial publicity which mentions mental illness or not. The pretrial media to which participants are exposed (mentions mental illness vs. no mention of mental illness) will have an effect on the verdict they give.

Method

Participants

Forty individuals participated in the experiment. Twenty-two participants identified as women; 12 as men, two as non-binary and four did not indicate their gender. Participants were 18 years or older (as per requirements for jury duty). They ranged in age from 18 to 66 years (mean age 28.9 years) and were recruited via adverts on social media (Facebook and Twitter). All participants were required to have English as their first language, and to reside in the UK. No payment or other incentives were offered for participation.

Design

An experimental, between-participants design was used. The independent variable was pre-trial publicity type, and there were two conditions. In one condition, participants read a newspaper article which stated that the defendant had a mental illness. In the control condition, participants read a newspaper article which did not state that the defendant had a mental illness. The dependent variable was juror verdict, guilty or not guilty.

Materials

Mock newspaper articles containing animage of the accused and text outlining aspects of the case were created to represent pretrial publicity. Two versions of the newspaper article were created, one for each condition. The articles were identical other than the headline and one sentence relating to the defendant's mental health. In the condition that mentioned the defendant's mental illness, the article headline read: 'Mental patient on trial for armed robbery'. The second sentence of the article stated, 'the 33-year-old defendant, who has a diagnosis of schizophrenia, is accused of the reckless act'. In the condition with no mention of mental illness, the headline read '33-year-old man on trial for armed robbery'. The second sentence of the article stated, ' the 33-year-old defendant is accused of the reckless act'.

A 50-minute video of a mock trial was created, representing the case of a 33-year-old male accused of carrying out an armed robbery. The video showed the judge's instructions to the jury, evidence from an eyewitness, evidence from a police officer, and evidence from a security expert. Throughout the trial questions and statements from the prosecution and defence advocates were presented. Closing statements from the defence and prosecution were then shown, with the final section of the video showing the judge's instructions to the jury.

Participants completed the experiment online, using the experimental software Gorilla. Participants used their own devices (laptop, phone or tablet).

Procedure

Participants were provided with information outlining the requirements of the task before consenting to take part. They were instructed to complete the experiment online, on their own device, in one sitting, individually and free from any distractions. Participants were randomly allocated to a condition; half were allocated to the condition in which they were presented with pretrial publicity that mentions mental illness and the other were allocated to the condition in which the pretrial publicity made no mention of mental illness. After reading the mock newspaper article (version dependent on condition) all participants watched the 50-minute video of a mock trial. Participants could not pause, fast forward or rewind the video. Once the video had ended, participants were asked to give a verdict of either guilty or not guilty by selecting the relevant option. Responses were automatically recorded.

Participants were then asked to provide their age and gender (with the option of non-disclosure) before being fully debriefed. The debriefing provided participants with information on the aims of the study, how to withdraw their consent and have their data removed and the contact details of the experimenter. The whole procedure took approximately 1 hour.

Results

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Discussion

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References

Bakhshay, S., & Haney, C. (2018). The media's impact on the right to a fair trial: A content analysis of pretrial publicity in capital cases.Psychology, Public Policy, and Law,24(3), 326.

DaftaryKapur, T., Dumas, R., & Penrod, S. D. (2010). Jury decisionmaking biases and methods to counter them.Legal and Criminological Psychology,15(1), 133-154.

Hoetger, L. A., Devine, D. J., Brank, E. M., Drew, R. M., & Rees, R. (2022). The impact of pretrial publicity on mock juror and jury verdicts: A meta-analysis.Law and human behavior,46(2), 121.

Hope, L., Memon, A., & McGeorge, P. (2004). Understanding pretrial publicity: Predecisional distortion of evidence by mock jurors.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied,10(2), 111.

Link, B. G., Phelan, J. C., Bresnahan, M., Stueve, A., & Pescosolido, B. A. (1999). Public conceptions of mental illness: labels, causes, dangerousness, and social distance.American journal of public health,89(9), 1328-1333.

Mossire, A., & Maeder, E. M. (2015). Defendant mental illness and juror decision-making: A comparison of sample types.International journal of law and psychiatry,42, 58-66.

Pescosolido, B. A., Monahan, J., Link, B. G., Stueve, A., & Kikuzawa, S. (1999). The public's view of the competence, dangerousness, and need for legal coercion of persons with mental health problems.American journal of public health,89(9), 1339-1345.

Ruva, C. L., Guenther, C. C., & Yarbrough, A. (2011). Positive and negative pretrial publicity: The roles of impression formation, emotion, and predecisional distortion.Criminal Justice and Behavior,38(5), 511-534.

Steblay, N. M., Besirevic, J., Fulero, S. M., & Jimenez-Lorente, B. (1999). The effects of pretrial publicity on juror verdicts: A meta-analytic review.Law and Human Behavior,23, 219-235.