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This is actually quite an interesting case study for jury selection / vetting. The motive clearly relates to political views about the healthcare industry that affect every single American other than extreme outliers. It's therefore pretty impossible to select a jury that can be entirely neutral. Because no matter how politically unengaged they are, it still affects them.
Arguably, the most neutral person would be someone who hasn't interacted much with healthcare as a citizen. But healthcare issues in America start straight away from birth, because the process of birth itself is a healthcare matter for both mother and child, and there's no opting out from being born. That's only not the case if you're foreign born or from a very wealthy background, but you can't have a jury comprised of just them because that's not representative of the American public.
I wouldn't be surprised if this drags on for a long time before any trial even starts. In fact, I'd be suspicious if it doesn't.
Many young, healthy people haven't had to deal with it much, but this is also the demographic highly engaged on social media and probably very sympathetic to him.
If you think of other issues, it's not as strange as you would think. If someone is accused of speeding and goes to trial, or reckless manslaughter for a traffic accident, let's say, the jury will be filled with drivers, most of whom break traffic laws on a daily basis.
As a result of this obvious impasse, the standard is not whether people have exposure to the general issue or the shitty system at hand. You can be sure the prosecution will pretend it is, and the defense will point out it's not.
I'd argue that's not really equivalent, because being a driver or not doesn't really have any implications towards motive in that case, or sympathy towards it from a jury. It's also not political - or at least, most people don't see it that way.
My point is, this is a race that almost every American has a horse in. So how do you draw a satisfactorily unbiased jury? I don't have the answer, but I can see why it's evidently become a sticking point.
Everyone has a horse in the race, just like with breaking traffic laws. If I'm a juror on a speeding case, and I speed too, of course I'm likely to be sympathetic to the defendant. Similarly, what about cops investigating or testifying about DV when over 1/3 of them beat their families? There's bias, but the "justice" system still operates.
Or we could look at the Google trials. Are we seriously thinking that no potential jurors would be able to have ever used use their services or products? ... That all just doesn't work. It's nearly impossible to avoid Google. And your standard is even lower -- you're talking about exclusion based on use of competing companies in the field along with the company itself. In other words, I can't be a juror on a Google case if I've used Google or Apple or Microsoft products...? That's the parallel to the health insurance industry.
Of course that standard couldn't possibly make sense, and legal scholars knew this centuries ago. So it's not how the law works, and it never was.
It just doesn't equate with traffic offences, because it's not seen as a political matter. In fact, they're generally strict liability meaning motive isn't in question anyway.
Broad claims about DV in officers, again, don't cast into doubt an individual witness (without even going into the veracity of that number), which is a separate point from jury vetting anyway.
Again, with Google, having used a product doesn't necessarily mean bias is present as you rightly point out. Is using Google going to influence someone the same as systematic healthcare issues that are central to the motive in this case? Clearly not.
I'm not disagreeing with your sentiment. I'm just telling you for a fact that there are very good reasons why the composition of the jury is especially crucial in this particular case, for both sides. Of course that's always an issue to some extent, but the profile and nature of this case are unique. The proof of this is in the very article we're commenting on, so I'm not sure what you disagree with.
Just import a jury