English Trials Heard by Chinese Jurors: An Experimental Study on Jury Comprehension in Hong Kong

Abstract

Studies in jury comprehension have been largely carried out in monolingual legal systems where jurors speak English as their native language or English operates as a societal lingua franca and focused on jurors’ ability to understand legalese or to follow and evaluate highly technical and scientific evidence given by expert witnesses (e.g. Charrow and Charrow 1979; Cecil et al. 1991; McKimmie et al. 2014; Ritter 2004) This paper reports the findings of an experimental research project[1] on jury comprehension in the Hong Kong courtroom, where English-medium trials are argued before Chinese jurors who speak English as a second or even foreign language. The subjects of this study were all eligible for the jury service, some with actual jury experience and others without. Segments of authentic audio recordings of two jury trials were used to test their comprehension of courtroom discourse made in English. The results show that most of the subjects had great difficulty in understanding English speeches made by judges and counsel and the comprehension problem is not restricted to legalese or technical evidence. It is also found that the subjects’ comprehension does not have much to do with their educational levels and that those with actual jury experience did not necessarily perform better than those without. The results of this study highlight an urgent need to ensure jurors’ full access to the court proceedings for justice to be delivered.