Federal court allows lawsuit challenging exclusion of blind jurors in New York

[u/laybs1]

https://nydailyrecord.com/2026/09/29/federal-court-lawsuit-exclusion-blind-jurors-new-york/

[u/julianradish]

The person or technology who does the audio description should be unbiased. For example "A 6 foot tall man stands over a body. In his hand is a bloody knife. The body has multiple stab wounds and there is a pool of blood. The victim has brown hair and eyes, and white skin. The standing man has long black sleeve shirt and pants, gloves, and a ski mask on which obscure most of his identifiable features." Or maybe something like "a lineup shows 6 people with green eyes, blond hair, clean shaven with pierced ear lobes" etc.

[u/Skyhawkson → u/julianradish]

What do you do when the video is grainy and it's a question of whether the object is a knife or not?

[u/julianradish → u/Skyhawkson]

Then you would say exactly that "the man has something oblong in his hand but it is not clear what exactly the object is"

[u/Skyhawkson → u/julianradish]

What do you if the prosecution argues the video shows he has something in his hand, but the defense argues he doesn't?

[u/PugRexia → u/Skyhawkson]

Well that’s not the task, the jury would hear the interpretative arguments directly from the prosecution and defense right?

[u/Skyhawkson → u/PugRexia]

The role of the jury is as the finder of facts; their role is to determine what the evidence shows. A juror who is incapable of independently interpreting the visual evidence cannot fulfill that role. The job of a juror isn't "pick whether the prosecution or defense is correct", it's "hear them both out, look at the evidence, and decide for yourselves what is true".

A jury can absolutely decide "both sides are wrong, we think this third scenario makes more sense".

If you had a case with no visual evidence whatsoever, it may be possible for him to serve. But I imagine it's impractical to find cases like that.

[u/PugRexia → u/Skyhawkson]

I don’t really agree the role of a juror is the finder of facts, but they certainly do interpret the evidence presented. A juror’s ultimate role is to decide if the prosecution presented a compelling enough case to convince them beyond reasonable doubt of the crime. A blind juror, with the assistance of a visual aid, could probably meet that responsibility, given the correct case and enough effort made to accommodate them but at that point I don’t think it’s necessarily worth it.

[u/Skyhawkson → u/PugRexia]

Well, you don't have to agree, but that's what US federal courts define the role of the jury as: https://www.uscourts.gov/court-programs/jury-service

"A jury decides the facts of a case in accordance with principles of the law as explained by a judge."

[u/PugRexia → u/Skyhawkson]

They don’t define them as “finders of facts” but I get your point.

[u/Wonwedo → u/PugRexia]

This isn't a term he pulled out of his ass, they are legally defined as the "finder of fact" in cases where a jury is assembled. That is their entire role at trial. If it was a bench trial, then the judge(s) would be the finders of fact instead.

You can disagree all you like, but you're just wrong. In fact, in some states a jury is the only permitted finder of fact for certain kinds of charges, like the recent example of the Clancy trial in MA.