Juries Find Their Central Role in Courts Fading
"Why have a jury at all?" one former juror, Michael
McCarthy asked bitterly in an interview.

Mr. McCarthy said he and his fellow jurors were
outraged in December when a Houston judge told
them that Texas' tort-reform law would require a
reduction of more than $100 million in an award
they had given the family of a pipefitter killed in an
industrial accident at a Phillips Petroleum plastics
plant in 1999.

The worker, Juan Martinez Jr., died when highly
volatile chemicals exploded in a 500-degree fireball.
The jury concluded that the accident had resulted
from lax safety measures at the complex, which had
experienced three explosions over 12 years,
including one that killed 23 workers and injured
132 others in 1989.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/02/national/02JURY.html?pagewanted=all