Dr. Ahmad Suliman AlOtaibi
Associate Professor and Head of Public Law Department
Kuwait International Law School (KILAW)

Abstract:

This paper examines the legal nature and historical origins of the Jury System. In this regard the study adopts the descriptive, analytical, and comparative approach. The first part of the study focuses on the legal nature of the jury system. It attempts to define the jury system, to shed light on its procedures and governing principles, to reveal the distinction between the trial by jury on the Common Law system and the conventional trial on the Civil Law system, and it offers contemporary applications of trial by jury (i.e., the jury trial system in the United Kingdom and the United State of America).
The second part of the study aims to examine the major theories of the origins of trial by jury. In an attempt to define the most accurate theory connected to the origins of the jury system, the study scrutinizes the theory advocated by the Anglo-Saxons, the theory associated with the Normans, the theory adopted by Ancient Greece, and finally the theory of Shahadat Al Lafif (Lafif Witnesses) the Islamic trial system of Imam Malik. In this regard, the study establishes a comparison between the rules and principles of the trial by jury and the trial system associated with the theories above.

Keywords: jury system, trial by jury, the origins of the jury system, theories of the origins of trial by jury, Shahadat Al Lafif.

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