California Jury Instructions

Plain Language Civil and Criminal Jury Instructions

To address possible inappropriate use of social media and the internet by jurors, the attached poster was developed for distribution to California trial courts. The poster is a tool to remind jurors that existing bans on research and dissemination of trial-related information apply to all forms of electronic and wireless communication.

Use of the poster is optional. PDF versions of the poster are provided in two sizes:
8.5" x 11" and 11" x 17".

Jury Instructions For Judges and Attorneys

The Judicial Council of California has adopted award-winning plain language civil and criminal jury instructions that accurately convey the law using language that is understandable to jurors.

California Civil
Jury Instructions for Judges and Attorneys
(CACI)

California Criminal
Jury Instructions for Judges and Attorneys
(CALCRIM)

Notice to Users

The Judicial Council of California owns the copyright in the Jury Instructions, and in posting the Jury Instructions on the Worldwide Web, the Judicial Council seeks to make the instructions available to the public and hereby grants members of the public a nonexclusive license to reproduce or modify the jury instructions, except as limited hereinafter.

The nonexclusive public license granted in the preceding paragraph does not extend to any commercial publisher for purposes of reproducing the instructions (in any format), preparing derivative works based on them, or publicly distributing or displaying copies of them. The Judicial Council will consider licensing commercial publishers on a case-by-case basis. For purposes of this license, "commercial publishers" means entities that publish works for sale, whether for profit or otherwise.

For such inquiries, contact Grant Walker at (415) 865-7978.