stylistic:tone, quality:corruption
Norway

Juries existed in Norway as early as the year 800, and perhaps even earlier. They brought the jury system to England and Scotland. Juries were phased out as late as the 17th century, when Norway's central government was in Copenhagen, Denmark. Though Norway and Denmark had different legal systems throughout their personal union (1387–1536), and later under the governmental union (1536–1814), there was attempt to harmonize the legal systems of the two countries. Even if juries were abolished, the layman continued to play an important role in the legal system throughout in Norway.

The jury was reintroduced in 1887, and was then solely used in criminal cases on the second tier of the three-tier Norwegian court system (" Lagmannsretten "). The jury consisted of 10 people, and had to reach a majority verdict consisting of seven or more of the jurors. The jury never gave a reason for its verdict, rather it simply gave a "guilty" or "non-guilty" verdict. The jury foreperson, elected by the jury on the first day, with three other jury members also made up the majority in the sentencing, if the accused were found guilty.

In Norway the term "guilty", is not used, only yes or no to the actions asked them to consider done by the accused by the prosecutor. The last jury case was in 2018, after juries were abolished after the European Court condideres that no-one should be sentenced without the considerations in the judgement.

In a sense, the concept of being judged by one's peers existed on both the first and second tier of the Norwegian court system: In Tingretten, one judge and two lay judges preside, and in Lagmannsretten two judges and five lay judges preside. The lay judges do not hold any legal qualification, and represent the peers of the person on trial, as members of the general public. As a guarantee against any abuse of power by the educated elite, the number of lay judges always exceeds the number of appointed judges. In the Supreme Court, only trained lawyers are seated.