Civil Jury Trial: Law, Practice and Precedents

Description

Author: The Hon Bernard Barton | ISBN:  9781917134217 | Format: Hardback | Price:  €Not Fixed | Publishing:  Winter 2025/6

About

The concept of trial by jury, whether for serious criminal offences or in serious cases for civil wrongs, lies at the heart of the common law legal system established under the Constitution.

While jury trial in criminal matters features prominently in the several Irish text books published on criminal law and the law of evidence there is, by contrast, no contemporary text specifically on the subject of civil jury trial and the right to trial by jury in civil proceedings.

Apart from the need to fill a long overdue information deficit in this area of law for the legally curious the purpose of this book is to provide judges and practitioners engaged in civil litigation with a practical companion on the law relating to and the practice and procedure of civil jury trial.

That the concept of jury trial, enshrined in the Magna Carta, has survived to the modern day is testament to the resilience this mode of trial as the best means of preserving and protecting the civil liberties of the individual. Conceived and found to be a bulwark against the arbitrary misuse of power through the involvement of the public in the administration of justice, jury trial is above all a quintessential manifestation of democracy in the justice system.

While the right to trial by jury for serious criminal offences enshrined in the Constitution is well understood and the subject of much study and discourse, the same cannot be said for the statutory right to jury trial in civil proceedings. From experience the extent of the right is not generally appreciated, even by those practicing in civil litigation, as a consequence of which litigants can be left without advice on the entitlement to a jury trial as of right, a lacuna comprehensively addressed by this book.

Contents Includes

• Origin and evolution of civil jury trial; Judicature Acts, Independence; Courts of Justice Act 1924
• Entitlement to a jury in civil proceedings
  • Restriction of right to jury trial in personal injury actions-exceptions-effect of Courts Act 1988
  • Subsisting right to jury trial in civil proceedings; exercise of right
  • Causes of action triable by jury as of right;
  • Jury membership : Ineligible, Incapable and disqualified persons;
  • Jury verdicts; majority verdict;
  • Practice and Procedure;
  • Empanelling a civil jury;
  • Judge’s address to a jury panel;
  • Judge’s address to a sworn jury;
  • Choosing a jury foreperson;
  • Interlocutory applications;
  • Order of address to jury by parties;
  • Judicial behaviour at trial;
  • Withdrawal of proceedings from a jury;
  • Opening and closing addresses;
  • Issue paper; Requisitions ;
  • Role and duties of judge and jury;
  • Judge’s charge to the jury;
  • Directions on the law; summing up;
  • Damages; content of charge.

• Guidance to a jury on damages in defamation
  • Distinction between damages in defamation and personal injuries;
  • Higgins’ guidelines on damages in defamation; Law of defamation and juries; statutory defences; practice and procedure; Malicious Falsehood;
• Trespass to the person; causes of action; defences
  • Wrongful arrest/ false imprisonment; Other causes of action triable by jury.
• Precedents
  • Sample addresses by counsel and judicial charges on the law to the jury in defamation and trespass actions.

Who Should Buy This Book?

Civil Jury Trial: Law, Practice and Precedents provides invaluable source material for legal practitioners, judges, academics and anyone interested the origins, evolution, entitlement and extent of the right to trial by jury in civil proceedings in Ireland and civil jury trial practice and procedure.

About the Author

The Hon Bernard Barton SC is a retired judge of the High Court who served as head of the civil juries division of the court from 2017 until retirement in 2021. In that role he presided over many of the most important high profile defamation cases of the last decade. Called to the Bar in 1977 and Inner Bar in 1997, he had an extensive practice in civil litigation, including before civil juries.