The Nebraska “Juror’s Handbook” says about a juror’s duty “You are expected to use your common sense, common knowledge, and experience as a mature person in arriving at a verdict.” As I said in my comment (one of the portions you didn’t reproduce), I don’t think that something like bible quotes should be a discussion topic amongst the jurors, however a personal juror’s reasoning should be able to be backed up through their “experience as a mature person” of which could easily include the Bible. See as 75%+ of the US is currently of a Christian faith, I could also argue that would fall under “common knowledge.”

The last paragraph of your above statement is exactly what I’m arguing especially the line “A juror is perfectly free to consider his or her religious beliefs in their decision, and possibly even to raise those concerns during deliberations…” I feel that the judges should not have repealed the verdict simply because a juror was doing just that. I also feel that it would become nitpicky to make a distinction between a juror who has memorized bible passages and one who brings a slip of paper with passages written on it.

According to the article, “five jurors had looked up Bible verses, copied some of them down and then talked about them behind closed doors.”

This is illegal regardless of how you look at it. We aren’t talking about “a juror” as you describe, but five of them! I am willing to excuse jurors going to the bible for guidance between deliberations (religious conviction), but to copy passages down and deliberate with them – ostensibly to sway other jurors – is absolutely out of bounds.

These jurors acted irresponsibly: they attempted to consider, as a group, material (the bible) that was not admitted as evidence. That is illegal, and grounds for an appeal.

The prosecutors are right though: jurors should be allowed to use their faith to make decisions – individually. There are few to zero cases I can think of where faith is a legitmate discussion point at the deliberation table.

Of course, a person’s faith and convictions should be involved in his decisions at the deliberation table, but the lines need to be drawn somewhere.

According to Justice Nancy Rice “Bible discussions that occurred took up little time and were not meant to convince other jurors to vote for the death penalty.” The picture being painted of five jurors conspiring to sway the other jurors with their bible quotations is on the verge of absurdity. I maintain that the only reason a big deal was made out of this is that the quotes came out of a religous text. Had five jurors written down quotes from one of the Harry Potter books to take in with them, then nothing would have been said.

” Considering the bible is out – but one’s individual convictions are not.”

To be fair to the people who brought the passages in, many individuals’ convictions are defined by the Bible. There may be few or no decisions they make that aren’t guided by that book.

As much as people seem to think otherwise, you cannot work religion out of any system where we make moral decisions. There is no line to draw sometimes, unless you’re asserting that those people should be left out. Which is what I think Myles’ fear is.