Judges,juries, and the decision to convict

The bureaucratic context of criminal prosecution emphasizes efficiency; its legal context emphasizes due process and procedural fairness. This paper focuses on the trial stage of prosecution where both concerns are central. It empirically examines the bench trial, an alternative to the more commonly used plea of guilty and the more traditional trial by jury. A comparison between trial by judge and trial by jury reveals striking differences in determinations of guilt. These differences have implications for commonly held assumptions about both jury and judicial behavior.