At the moment you only have a right to a jury trial for offences that carry a maximum sentence of two years or more. This is most offences. They are consulting on whether they should move to three, five or seven years.
If it moved to three years, it is estimated to reduce the number of jury trials by 7%.
Five years would see a 16% reduction.
Seven years would see a 23% reduction.
I think seven years would be too high a threshold. A possible sentence of five or six years should need a jury trial.
There is only one offence that has a maximum four year penalty so that if one goes for five years, effectively you will be saying that offences with a two or three year maximum will not get a jury trial. Those sort of offences never get the maximum, so in. reality would almost always just get a home detention sentence unless they are a serious recidivist.
David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders
Five years would see a 16% reduction.
Seven years would see a 23% reduction.
I think seven years would be too high a threshold. A possible sentence of five or six years should need a jury trial.
There is only one offence that has a maximum four year penalty so that if one goes for five years, effectively you will be saying that offences with a two or three year maximum will not get a jury trial. Those sort of offences never get the maximum, so in. reality would almost always just get a home detention sentence unless they are a serious recidivist.
David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders
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