When did professional jury selection start as a career?

Question

Attorneys have always handled jury selection themselves, and still do to this day.

However, more attorneys are eliciting the help of professional jury consultants to aid in this sensitive part of the trial.

What are the roots of this as a career?

When did it become popular for someone to become a professional jury selector?

Answer 1

Don't know when. Sounds like a good career. Wish I had thought of it.

Answer 2

Let's be very specific here:  Juries are selected with the approval of the prosecuting attorney & the defense attorney during a process known as "voir dire."

The pool of potential jury members are determined by names of persons randomly submitted to the courts by perhaps everyone who has received a driver's license or some other group of individuals.

Defense attorneys, though not public defenders,particularly in high-profile criminal matters, have seen the distinct advantage of having jurors who have a particular "profile" determine the guilt, or not, of their client(s).

So, to better determine the ideal jury, defense attorneys have relied recently on consultants who determine the most sympathetic to the defense attorney's client.

For an example:  In the murder trial of OJ Simpson, no defense attorney would want to have a person who was a parent of a daughter murdered by a jealous spouse or domestic abuse counselor seated on that jury, right?

Jury consultants usually have some experience in the legal system as well as a background in psychology.

"Mock" or simulated trials are conducted within the defense attorney'soffices to fine-tune the profile of who that defense attorney should reject during the voir dire portion of the real trial.