Common-sense Disutility of the Erroneous Verdicts in Criminal Trials

Abstract

As expressed by the famous Blackstone’s ratio, the beyond reasonable doubt standard of proof is based on the law’s primary motivation to avoid false conviction at the expense of increasing the probability of false acquittal. In contrast, jurors may have common-sense motivation to avoid both types of error. With 100 juror-eligible adults in Korea, the present study demonstrated that utilities of the two types of decision error were evaluated relative to those of the correct decisions rather than each other. The utility of false conviction was evaluated relative to that of a correct acquittal of an innocent defendant, and the utility of false acquittal in relation to that of a correct conviction of a guilty defendant. If this psychological configuration of the utilities is held by jurors in the courtroom, it suggests that they may have double standards for the fact-finding; one to decide on the question of guilt under the presumption of innocence and the other to decide on the question of innocence deduced from the presumption of guilt. Double standards will increase the frequency of punishing innocent defendants.