Well, by a slim margin, the Colorado Supreme Court has decided that it is not Constitutional to consult the Bible during
jury deliberations. I've been a juror twice, once for a state murder trial, and the other a Fed drug trial, and it's been my experience that Bibles are not provided to jurors in the Jury Room.
The Colorado Supreme Court on Monday threw out the death penalty in a rape-and-murder case because jurors had studied Bible verses such as "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" during deliberations.
The really frightening thing about being a juror is the realization of just what a jury of one's peers is. Prosecutors do not necessarily want the brightest bulbs in the box, and defense attorney's have their own agenda. But what is to be made of these folks that used the Good Book to mete out justice?
The jurors in Harlan's 1995 trial sentenced him to die, but defense lawyers discovered five of them had looked up Bible verses, copied them down and talked about them while deliberating a sentence behind closed doors.
The Supreme Court said that "at least one juror in this case could have been influenced by these authoritative passages to vote for the death penalty when he or she may otherwise have voted for a life sentence."
Or is it worse that 2 of the 5 justices thought "an eye for an eye" was acceptable?