00:02It's a cornerstone of the justice system, the right to face a jury of 12 of your peers.
00:08But a new report has found Indigenous people standing trial are not being reflected in the jury pool.
00:14Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders appear in the criminal justice system more than any other member of our community,
00:21yet anecdotally we know they are not appearing in juries.
00:24South Australia's Law Reform Institute says the reasons why are complex.
00:29A key issue is the use of the electoral roll as the sole source of selecting jurors.
00:35Aboriginal people either may not be on the electoral roll or if they are on the electoral roll,
00:39the address that is given may not be where they actually live.
00:43The report makes 34 recommendations, including changes to strict criminal history disqualifications.
00:50It's not clear to me that if someone has a bad driving record,
00:53they wouldn't be able to turn their mind to sophisticated questions about whether someone's innocent or not.
01:00The Aboriginal Legal Rights Movement says the disparity can leave a defendant feeling unrepresented.
01:06The first thing is that they're not sure of the system.
01:10They look at all the faces and there's nothing there that would make them feel at ease.
01:17But it says Indigenous participation on juries must be a free choice.
01:22I don't want it to be imposed on anyone and we've had too much part of our history where we
01:29had things imposed on us.
01:31In a statement, Attorney General Kaya Ma says juries should be representative of the communities they serve
01:37and is aware of barriers to Indigenous participation in SA.
01:41He says the government will consider the report's recommendations and respond in due course.
01:46Thanks very much for staying in the Lynx.
01:49A
