Chapter 33
The ones who matter
(Third person)
The jury is a fundamental part of all trials throughout the world which involve a risk of life imprisonment. In Italy, as in many other countries, it has the right and the power, although it’s all theoretical, of deciding victory or defeat. Of marking time between freedom and imprisonment.
In the case of Alfredo Riccio, of deciding how he would spend the next thirty years of his life.
The reason for its importance, and every lawyer is well aware of this, lies in how very easily it can be influenced. And this is because, although the line-up of the six members of the jury could, with a majority, overturn a guilty verdict of the judges, in practice it’s the Presiding Judge who initially steers the trial decision based on what law experts cal
