Research On The French Mixed Jury System

The French mixed jury system began with the failure of transform the British jury system.Beginning with the introduction of the 18th century,the jury system was repeatedly pulled between liberalism and conservatism as the regime changed.In the end,on the basis of the litigation concept based on the pursuit of will public order,French decided to abandon the jury system and switch to the participation system in which citizens and professional judges jointly tried the case.The French mixed jury system only applies to criminal felony who may be sentenced to imprisonment for more than ten years.The French law provides for a broader scope and rigorous procedures for the selection of the assessor.The assessor must be at least 23 years old and can reading,writing and communication in French,if a citizen meets the above conditions and is unrestricted to serve as an assessor,he or she can enter the list of candidates for the annual assessors.After the selection of the candidate list is completed,the court will select the list to get an official annual list.The annual list of assessors is equivalent to a fixed database.In each subsequent felony case,the annual list of assessors is again selected to determine the specific list of participants.At the same time,the French law also provides detailed regulations on the trial procedures,collegial procedures and appeal methods of the trial cases.The trials apply the principle of direct speech,and the trial is not interrupted.At the final collegiality,the presiding judge passes the list of questions.The method asks the assessors and,after obtaining an affirmative or negative answer from the participants,the final result is obtained.The French mixed jury system adopts the selection mechanism of "election in every case",giving the presiding judge additional authority to balance the court order,formulating a list of problem list and standardizing the collegiate method,and stipulating the felony case rotation appeal system to guarantee the rights of the defendant.The rationality of the theory and practice is also due to the fact that the French mixed jury system has only experienced hundreds of years since its implementation,while the domestic acquittal rate has been reduced and the social situation has become more stable.Of course,the trial took long,and the problems of a certain degree of contradiction in the judgments of"reasoning" and "intuition" are also highlighted in practice and become the real dilemma of the system.The promulgation of the people's assessor of the People's Republic of China officially marks the establishment of the people's assessor system in the form of law.However,in the process of concrete implementation of the people's assessor system,there is still"specialization of jury"and"assessors did not have substantive participation in the trial".In order to make the people's assessor system work better,it is considerable to learn the rules and practices from some experienced country.As a typical country which apply mixed jury system,France's rationality and realistic predicament in its operation are worth learning for China.