What is the fancy name for jury selection?
Asked by: Prof. Howard Wehner | Last update: March 11, 2026Score: 4.4/5 (70 votes)
The fancy, legal term for jury selection, where a judge and lawyers question potential jurors to find unbiased ones, is "voir dire" (pronounced vwah deer), a French phrase meaning "to speak the truth," and it's a crucial stage to ensure a fair and impartial jury.
What is the name for jury selection?
Voir dire is a legal term that means 'to speak the truth. ' It refers to the jury selection process in which attorneys and sometimes the judge question prospective jurors to determine their suitability and impartiality for serving on a jury in a particular case.
What is a synonym for select a jury?
Synonyms: choosing, selecting, choice , triage, election , electing, voting, vote , cherry-picking, free choice, opting, sorting , culling, cull, Hobson's choice.
What is jury duty selection called?
Selection Process
The judge and the attorneys ask jurors questions to determine if the jurors are free of bias (prejudice) or whether there is any other reason why any of them cannot be fair and impartial; this process is called voir dire.
What is a synonym for juror?
Common synonyms for "juror" include juryman, jurywoman, member of the jury, peer, panelist, or simply juror itself, referring to someone who hears evidence and delivers a verdict in court, while more formal terms might include adjudicator or assessor, and a specific role is the foreperson (or foreman/forewoman).
Voir Dire Prosecution 1 of 3
What are 5 synonym words?
Here are 5 examples of synonyms, showing different words with similar meanings: Happy/Joyful, Big/Large, Fast/Quick, Smart/Intelligent, and Beautiful/Attractive, demonstrating how synonyms enrich vocabulary and writing by offering varied choices for the same core idea.
What is a jury member called?
Anyone who's a member of a jury in a court of law is called a juror. When you serve as a juror, you're part of a group that hears evidence in a trial and gives a verdict. When someone gets called for jury duty, it's an opportunity to be a juror for a trial.
What is a jury decision called?
Verdict: The formal decision or finding made by a jury, which has been impaneled and sworn for the trial of a case, and reported to the court. Once the verdict has been reached, the jury is brought back into the courtroom.
What are the two types of jury duty?
There are two types of juries serving different functions in the federal trial courts: petit juries and grand juries.
What is an alternate for a jury?
What are alternate jurors? Sometimes, when the judge believes a case is likely to last for more than a day or 2, additional jurors will be chosen from those summoned for jury duty, questioned and challenged like other prospective jurors.
What does empanel mean?
The same as impanel, empanel means to choose and seat the jury for a case. The basic steps to empanelling a jury include: 1) Randomly gathering together a group of prospective jurors.
What words can I use instead of trial?
Instead of "trial," you can use words like test, experiment, attempt, tryout, examination, audition, ordeal, hearing, or litigation, depending on whether you mean a test/proof, a legal proceeding, or a hardship. Consider synonyms like dry run, practice, probation, endeavor, struggle, or challenge for variety.
What does "voir dire" literally mean?
Voir dire literally means "to speak the truth" from Old French, referring to the court process of questioning potential jurors or witnesses to determine their honesty, biases, and suitability to serve or testify fairly in a case, ensuring an impartial hearing.
Do judges get called for jury duty?
Judges are legally not exempt from jury service and actually never were. Those who do serve rarely get selected. Most often, the sitting trial judge opts to excuse that familiar face looking back at them from the audience without even asking the attorneys.
What is the proper name for challenging a jury?
A peremptory challenge is made by an attorney who wishes to have a person excused from jury service without giving or having to justify a reason that they would be an unsuitable juror.
What is another word for jury selection?
The selection of jurors is the first step in the actual trial of a jury case and the first step of this selection process is called "voir dire" (a full definition of "voir dire" is given above).
What is another word for jury?
Common synonyms for jury include panel, committee, board, council, and tribunal, often used for judging competitions or making decisions; while in a legal context, peers and judges are relevant, with specific types like grand jury and petit jury also used.
What is the Latin word for verdict?
Etymology. The term "verdict", from the Latin veredictum, literally means "to say the truth" and is derived from Middle English verdit, from Anglo-Norman: a compound of ver ("true", from the Latin vērus) and dit ("speech", from the Latin dictum, the neuter past participle of dīcere, to say).
What is juror #1 called?
Juror #1 is called the foreperson (or foreman/forewoman) of the jury, responsible for leading deliberations, taking votes, and signing official notes to the judge, though their vote carries no extra weight. In the famous movie 12 Angry Men, Juror #1 is an assistant high school football coach who takes his role seriously, as shown in sources 5, 7, 12.
What is a jury vote called?
Deliberations: The name for the discussions held by the jury to decide the outcome of a case. Evidence: Any type of proof legally presented during trial through witnesses, records or exhibits. Felony: A serious crime carrying a penalty of more than a year in prison.
What are the 12 people called in court?
Petit Jury: If you are selected to serve on a “Petit Jury,” you will hear a case which is criminal or civil. A criminal trial will involve a felony (a more serious type of crime). The law requires twelve (12) jurors to be seated in a criminal case, only eight (8) jurors are required in a civil case.
What is a cool word for five?
synonyms: 5, Little Phoebe, Phoebe, V, cinque, fin, fivesome, pentad, quint, quintet, quintuplet. digit, figure.
What are 5 new words?
Here are five recent or trending English words: Doomscrolling (excessive consumption of negative news), Nepo Baby (child of a celebrity/influential person benefiting from their parents' success), Infomic (rapid spread of accurate/inaccurate news), Promptcraft (training AI for better responses), and Noctalgia (loss of connection to the night sky).