This week in Travis County a Justice of the Peace conducted a jury trial that was historic for a couple of reasons.
The defendant was accused of speeding in a construction zone while workers were present. But that’s not what made the trial historic. In Texas, you get a jury trial for a speeding ticket if you want it. The jury can even set punishment in the event you are convicted, if you want it to.
What made this jury trial historic was a) that it was conducted online, over Zoom; and b) that it was watched live by about a thousand people (surging at one point to over 1,300).
This was the first online criminal jury trial in history, and probably the most-watched live trial in Texas history.
How’d it go?
The Washington Post wrote:
The glitch [of a juror who the judge “had to dismiss” because his connection froze] was the only major issue during the online proceeding Tuesday in an Austin misdemeanor court, a groundbreaking experiment as courts across the nation seek ways to restart the mo…