Moreover, if the judge is allowed to override a jury's collective deliberations and verdict and substitute his own whenever it is different, why even have a jury hear a penalty phase of a death penalty case.
Thx, Klydon. Historically, what is the reason/argument for letting judges set aside verdicts?
The jury is one of the important checks on the power of the state. It places the power of determining the facts of an alleged crime or controversy into the hands of the people, who are deemed more likely to render an unbiased determination of facts than the state. Judges are permitted to disturb a jury's guilty verdict if the verdict is against the great weight of evidence presented. The judge's overturning of the verdict is, of course, subject to appellate review. There is no historical justification, which allows a judge to alter a not guilty verdict and declare a defendant guilty.
The juries determine fact while the judge provides the law. There is the little used notion of jury nullification, which allows a jury to acquit a defendant if they reject the law. This would permit the jury into the realm of the judiciary, and is the ultimate in the ideal of a jury as a check on the power of the state.
