About 21 percent of the people who have served as lay judges in criminal trials since the new system got off the ground a year ago say they felt that professional judges tried to influence their judgment, a survey says.
More than 5,200 ordinary people have served on panels composed of six lay and three professional judges at 60 district courts and convicted and sentenced 903 of the 904 people tried in 858 cases, acquitting only one, since the first lay judge trial opened Aug. 3 in Tokyo, according to a tally by Kyodo News.
Of those involved, including alternates, 210 people at 33 district courts responded to the survey, with 73 percent saying that they didn't think the presiding judge or the other professional judges directed them in their closed-door deliberations on whether to convict or what sentence to give.