Today, we’re going to look at when you might want to have a bench trial in your Georgia traffic ticket case, versus having a jury trial. Let’s get started.
What is a trial?
A trial in a traffic ticket case is where the police say you broke a traffic law, but you don’t believe that you did. If you continue to say you’re not guilty, then eventually you will get put on a trial calendar and be tried on the charges the police are bringing against you. At the end of the trial, you’ll be found guilty or not guilty of the charges.
The players in a trial
Here are all the major players in a traffic ticket trial, and what their roles are.
Prosecutor
The prosecutor represents the state of Georgia and they are in charge of proving that you broke the law beyond a reasonable doubt. They are on the side of the police and will use every piece of evidence they have to try and prove that you broke whatever traffic law the police gave you a ticket for.
Defense Attorney
This is your advocate. Hopefully, if you’ve gotten to the trial stage, you will either have hired an attorney or gotten one appointed to your case, if you couldn’t afford one. Their role is to defend you, to challenge and call into question all the evidence the prosecution has in their arsenal, and, if it applies, present evidence on your behalf to show you are innocent. You are never required to prove your innocence – the prosecutor must prove instead that you are guilty – but if you have evidence that shows your innocence, then by all means, use it!
Defendant
This is you. You got the ticket, you’re defending your innocence, you’re in the hot seat. If for some reason you don’t have a lawyer, then you are the one who must challenge the prosecutor’s case. You’ll be treated like an attorney for the sake of your trial. You’ll be expected to know when to make objections and how, when to put in evidence and how, and to know when the different stages of the trial start and end. It’s always recommended that you watch trials in the same judge’s courtroom before your own trial, if you will be defending yourself. In fact, some judges even require this before they will schedule your trial if you’re representing yourself, so you can at least have an idea of what to do when the big day comes.
Judge
The judge is in charge. They are in charge of when your trial gets heard and how the trial proceeds. Think of him or her as the king or queen of their courtroom – what they say goes, and it is final. Regardless of if you have a bench trial or a jury trial, if you are found guilty of the charges, it is the judge who then pronounces your sentence or punishment as a result of your guilty conviction. It is important to always be respectful of the judge even if you do not agree with them. This goes for defendants and attorneys alike.
Jury
This is a 6 or 12 person panel (some traffic tickets only call for a 6 person member jury) made up of people in the community where court is being held in your case. They are selected during jury selection, called voir dire, and sometimes there is an additional one or two people to serve as alternate jurors, in case something happens with an original juror – like they get sick during the trial, and cannot make it to court. These are the people the prosecutor has to convince of your guilt during a jury trial.
What happens at trial?
No matter which trial you select, bench or jury, the same process is followed. The prosecution goes first with opening statements, where they say what they believe happened and how they will prove it and why they think you are guilty. Then, the defense (you or your attorney for you) will give their own opening statements, where they say what they believe happened and how the state is wrong, and why you are not guilty.
After opening, both sides present their evidence – prosecution goes first, and they usually get the police officer on the witness stand, along with any video or audio evidence recorded by the officer. Remember, the burden of proof, or responsibility to prove that you are guilty, is on the prosecutor and they will try to pin you and paint you in a bad light. During their evidence presentation however, your defense attorney (or you, if you are representing yourself) will get to cross-examine the witnesses and call into question the evidence as it is being presented, to poke as many holes in the prosecutor’s case as possible.
Once the prosecution is done with presenting their evidence, then, if your side as the defense has anything to present for evidence, you’ll do so here. Sometimes, you won’t have any evidence to present – and that is perfectly okay. Remember: you do not have to prove your innocence, it’s the prosecutor who is trying to prove your guilt. But, if you can show your innocence – then why not.
Then, once all the evidence has been put up and submitted, then both attorneys (or the prosecutor and you) make closing statements. Usually, the prosecutor decides to go last, because they want the last word. In that case, you or your attorney will need to make sure your closing statement is to the point, convincing, and points out all the flaws in the prosecutor’s case.
After that, you’ll be given a verdict – either by the judge or the jury – of guilty or not guilty regarding each of the charges against you.
If you are not guilty on all charges, then that’s it. You won. The prosecutor lost. You get to go home and not worry about anything else, except maybe clearing up any pre-trial license issues you may have with the DDS (Department of Driver Services).
But if you are found guilty on even one of your charges, then you must face the judge – literally. The judge is in charge of sentencing you and you will have a hearing on sentencing. More on that in a different post.
So that’s what happens at trial. Now, let’s look at a bench trial and a jury trial.
Jury Trial – Jury Decides and Judge Sentences
For a jury trial, the main audience is the jury. Those 6 or 12 people will decide your guilt or innocence. As a result, a lot of work goes into a jury trial – including the first step which is selecting a jury, or voir dire. This can take hours and even days, depending on how big the jury pool is. A lot of the extra time in the jury trial is the selection process. You are looking for people to be sympathetic to your viewpoint – and the prosecutor is going to try and keep those people off the jury. And of course, the prosecutor wants people to be sympathetic to their viewpoint – and you will want to try and keep those people off the jury. The end result is usually a pretty good mixture of people.
The rest of the trial proceeds the same as above, however you may see a lot more story telling or trying to pull on the heartstrings of the jury in both the prosecutor’s and your defense attorney’s evidence and case presentation. This will particularly come out in opening and closing statements.
At the end of the case, the judge will tell the jury what the specific laws are that they are going to evaluate your evidence against – and ultimately decide your guilt or innocence. After the jury knows their rules to follow and evaluate against, they will be escorted to the jury room to talk and decide what they all think. This could take as quick as a few minutes or as long as a few days, depending on the jury and the evidence. Every single person in the jury has to agree in order to get a valid verdict. Once they have the verdict, they’ll be taken back into the courtroom and the verdict will be formally announced. The rest of the trial will finish out as we discussed earlier, depending on if you are found guilty or not guilty.
Now, let’s compare this to a bench trial.
Bench Trial – Judge Decides and Judge Sentences
For a bench trial, you are looking at a bare-bones affair. There will not be any lengthy jury selection and there won’t be a super long time of deliberation afterwards – although on occasion a judge may take some time to make a final decision (called “taking it under advisement”). But usually, a judge can make up his or her mind right away. It’s what they do all day every day, afterall.
So – Bench Trial? Or Jury Trial?
It honestly depends on what kind of case you’re trying to present. If there’s a chance that, technically, you may be seen to break the law, then usually you wouldn’t want to have a bench trial – since a judge will see the technicality and hold it against you. But, if it’s super technical, perhaps a jury will be sympathetic with you – sure, maybe you looked bad on those DUI field sobriety tests, but the cop was a jerk to you even though you were super respectful and compliant, and you could spin it to say the cop was picking on you.
But, if you are technically not in violation of the law, and the prosecutor is not budging when you or your attorney points this out to him or her, then, you might want to have a bench trial. When it comes to the technical and nuances of the laws, judges shine. However, this may be lost on a jury, since they don’t live in a courtroom surrounded by laws, like a judge does.
As a general rule, it’s a lot harder for a prosecutor to get 6 or 12 people on the same page than for them to get one person (the judge) on the same page. This isn’t always true, but it’s something you hear a lot of defense attorneys say as to why they tend to encourage their clients to get a jury trial and not a bench trial. And it’s always your right as the defendant to be able to decide whether or not you want a jury trial – it is a constitutional right that no one can take away from you. Hopefully, those post helped you understand the differences between a bench trial and a jury trial, should you ever find yourself in a situation where you have to choose one or the other.
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