History Main / JokerJury

* This happens to {{Franchise/Batman}} a lot:

** In an AllJustADream example in ''ComicBook/ActionComics'' #286, while in the grip of a Red Kryptonite nightmare, Superman dreams that ComicBook/LexLuthor, ComicBook/{{Brainiac}}, and other villains put him on 'trial' for his alleged 'crimes' against them, and sentence him to battle ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} to the death in a gigantic arena or else stand by helplessly while they blow up the Earth.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheTransformersTheMovie'': The Quintessons set up a Joker Jury for ''everyone''. Those found innocent are fed to the Sharkticons. What a ''guilty'' verdict entails is open to speculation, but is probably one of those "you don't wanna know" things.
** One "official" book stated that the Quintessons did the judge thing for fun, and dumped the accused in the pit no matter the verdict.

[[folder:Web Comics]]
* In ''ComicStrip/{{Nodwick}}'', Yeager is put on trial by the "Council of Three-And-A-Half" which is later revealed to consist entirely of people he bullied as a child.

* Happens in ''WesternAnimation/AquaTeenHungerForce'' when Shake is called into Tree Court for dumping a huge vat of grease in the woods, then burning down a tree. Even his defense attorney is a shrub, who immediately squeals "GUILTY! MY CLIENT IS GUILTY!". Shake definitely doesn't help himself by [[BodyHorror ripping off the shrub's branches and covering himself in bark while holding the branches]], [[PaperThinDisguise to try to disguise himself as a tree MID-TRIAL]]!
** He got off better than his accomplice Carl, who ended up [[HumanResources supplying the parchment]] for the court's records.
** Of course, in a subversion of the usual "innocent victim/hero" part of this trope, the defendants both totally did what they were accused of.
--->'''Frylock:''' Y'all are just lucky trees are stupid. You're both guilty as hell, you know that, right?

* Can't forget Aang's trial by the citizens of Chin in ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender''
-->"You say what happened, and then I say what happened, and then I decide who's right. That's why we call it justice. Because it's 'just us'!"
* True to its roots, in the ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode "[[Recap/TheAdventuresOfBatmanAndRobinE3Trial Trial]]", Batman is captured and placed on trial by the inmates of Arkham Asylum -- and just to stack the deck further, his defending attorney was an outspoken critic of the vigilante who earlier blamed him for ostensibly provoking the mentally unstable into becoming criminals. Explaining the trial bit, Two-Face says, "Personally, [[WhyDontYaJustShootHim I suggested a quick slug between the eyes]]... but I lost the coin toss."

** This trope is subverted when the attorney becomes a female Franchise/PerryMason / Series/{{Matlock}} and proves Batman innocent by pointing out that the supervillains themselves are responsible for what's happened to them. DoubleSubverted when the villains end up finding Batman ''innocent'' and that they were all terrible people who screwed up their own lives but decide that ''because'' they're such terrible people, [[MortonsFork they'll kill him and his attorney anyway]]. Now that Batman's attorney has done her job, it's time for Batman to do his...

* In the final episode of ''WesternAnimation/BoJackHorseman'', a FreezeFrameBonus of the jurors at [[spoiler: [=BoJack=]'s]] trial reveals them to be pretty much all people whom the character has had conflicts with or otherwise pissed off in prior episodes. Played with, however, since despite this undeniable skewing of the scales it's also pretty unarguable that the character has had some kind of reckoning coming for a long time, as even they concede.

* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Duckman}}'' has him find himself in a town where everyone is related to Duckman's arch-nemesis, King Chicken, and they put him on trial for giving the wrong answer to the "chicken-egg" question.
** Although the actual jury was made up of a random collection of inbred idiots who accidentally sat in the jury box instead of the audience.
* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017'': In "[[Recap/DuckTales2017S3E21TheLifeAndCrimesOfScroogeMcDuck The Life and Crimes of Scrooge [=McDuck=]]]", Louie and Scrooge are summoned to a magical karmic court by their enemies (Doofus, Magica, Glomgold, and Ma Beagle) who want to try Scrooge for making them the villains that they became.

--> '''Judge [[EnemyWithout Imaginary Gary]]''': How does the (guilty) defendant plead (guilty)?

'''Joe:''' I don't think they [[spoiler:(WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons)]] see it that way.
* The ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'' episode "Wanted: Wade!", where [[ComicStrip/USAcres Wade the Duck]] actually starts thinking that he was a criminal after removing a tag on Orson Pig's chair. He then starts to have a nightmare where he is actually put on trial where Orson is the judge presiding over said trial and sentencing him to 9999 years in prison after declaring him guilty.
* Taken a step further on ''WesternAnimation/JimmyTwoShoes''. Not only is Cerbee tried with a Joker Jury, somehow every member is [[BigBad Lucius]].
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'' inverts the heroic and villainous roles by having Mr. Cat, the villain, be put on trial with the judge (who is none other than [[TheDitz Stumpy]]), the defense attorney ([[BitchInSheepsClothing Kaeloo]]) and the victim (Quack Quack) all wanting him to get punished. [[spoiler: [[ManipulativeBitch Kaeloo]] wins the case by manipulating Mr. Cat into confessing that he was guilty.]]

* One old WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes short called "The Trial of Mr. Wolf" featured Literature/LittleRedRidingHood being put on trial for crimes against the Big Bad Wolf. The judge, prosecutor, and entire jury are all wolves, save for a single juror who is a skunk. It actually ends up a subversion, as his story is so unbelievable that even the all-wolf jury finds the Big Bad Wolf's story a blatant lie. (And he doesn't help his case when he says, says, [[TemptingFate "And if I'm lying, I hope to get run over by a streetcar!"]] and [[CueTheFlyingPigs a streetcar smashes through the courtroom and runs him over]]. He then says, "Okay, maybe I did exaggerate a little...")

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheNewAdventuresOfWinnieThePooh'' involved Franchise/WinnieThePooh having a nightmare where he is put on trial by a jury of balloons after mistakenly losing Christopher Robin's balloon.

* There's an old and rather scary Disney short, "WesternAnimation/PlutosJudgementDay", in which Mickey's dog is lured to some sort of "dog Hell" and judged for the crime of tormenting cats. Everyone in the courtroom besides Pluto is a cat -- the judge, the bailiff, the prosecution, and the jury -- which obviously leads to him being declared ♫"G-U-I! L-T-Y! Guilty Guilty Guilty!"♫. Luckily for Pluto, it was AllJustADream.
** The jury "deliberation" consists of the cats in the jury marching out single file through a revolving door... and right back in again; the last ones in line haven't gotten to the door yet when the first ones start coming back in.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheRealGhostbusters'' episode "Jailbusters" has the ghostbusters kidnapped into the Ghost World and facing a trial for their "crimes" against the ghost kind.
* ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'' had a story where a fly fakes physical injuries to file a lawsuit against Rocko. The entire jury is made up of insects.

** This showed up in a Halloween special in the case of The Devil v. Homer, wherein The Devil (Flanders) contests that Homer sold his soul for a donut, which Homer finished. Due to the sheer incompetence of his attorney Lionel Hutz, Devil Flanders gets to fill the jury with some of Hell's most notorious residents, including John Wilkes Booth, UsefulNotes/RichardNixon[[note]](who wasn't even ''dead'' at the time the episode originally aired)[[/note]], and the starting lineup of the notorious 1976 Philadelphia Flyers hockey team. Nixon protests about being on the jury (since at the time the episode aired, he wasn't dead yet), but acquiesces when he is reminded by the Devil "I did a favour for ''you''."
** In the episode where Bart kills a bird with Nelson's BB gun, he imagines being put on trial by a tribunal of birds that sentence him to be pecked to death. The birds originally just called him there to put down newspaper, but then Bart just had to open his big mouth...

* Episode "Harmony Steals the Show" of ''WesternAnimation/TheSmurfs'': After dealing with a ghost for the greatest opera in exchange for his soul, Harmony is placed on trial by Death and the jury is made of ghosts.
* The ComicBook/GreenGoblin in ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries'' gives this to the board members who he blames for the 'death' of Norman Osborn, where he is Judge. He even has a Justice Statue with his face.
* Happens in two ''WesternAnimation/{{Superfriends}}'' episodes:
** 1973/74 episode "The Menace Of The White Dwarf". The Raven puts Superman through a trial with himself as judge and prosecutor and a jury consisting of his android doubles. Wendy, Marvin, and Wonder Dog act as Superman's defense attorneys.

** The Challenge episode "The Trial of the Superfriends". You'd think that after being stripped of their power sources, captured by the Legion of Doom, and put on display in Legion Headquarters, the "justice" of an obviously mock trial would be the least of the Justice Leaguers' concerns -- but it's the only thing they protest. The Four Leaguers', Batman and Robin, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern, are sentenced to battle Brainiac's androids of them who have their power items, the Utility Belts, Magic Lasso, and Power Ring.
--> '''Luthor:''' Grodd, swear them in.\\

* Subverted in the ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitansGo'' episode "A Farce". While the prosecutor is Brother Blood and the judge is the Brain, the jury are unbiased normal citizens and the Titans are actually found guilty of what they're on trial for.
* The ''WesternAnimation/TinyToonAdventures'' episode "Gang Busters" revolves around Buster trying to clear his name after being framed for stealing a slushie, with a jury made entirely of Yosemite Sam clones delivering a guilty verdict in the KangarooCourt.
* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/YinYangYo'', Carl The Evil Cockroach Wizard stages injury received from Yin and Yang while the two were in the midst of training which leads to a kangaroo court case. Naturally, the jury, witnesses, and judge are all their past villains.

** Two-Face puts a judge on trial in the ''Robin: Year One'' mini-series.

* One old WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes short called "The Trial of Mr. Wolf" featured Literature/LittleRedRidingHood being put on trial for crimes against the Big Bad Wolf. The judge, prosecutor, and entire jury are all wolves. It actually ends up a subversion, as his story is so unbelievable that even the all-wolf jury finds the Big Bad Wolf's story a blatant lie. (And he doesn't help his case when he says, says, [[TemptingFate "And if I'm lying, I hope to get run over by a streetcar!"]] and [[CueTheFlyingPigs a streetcar smashes through the courtroom and runs him over]]. He then says, "Okay, maybe I did exaggerate a little...")

* The standard M.O. of the mercenary/vigilante group the Jury in the MarvelUniverse.

** In an odd inversion, in a storyline that ran in ''Batman'' #291-294, Batman was missing and presumed dead, and villains placed themselves on trial before a court of their fellow villains, attempting to prove themselves guilty of Batman's murder.

* Q puts HumanityOnTrial (with Picard as the defense attorney) in [[BookEnds the pilot and series finale]] of ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration''.
** Q also warns Picard not to try any "lawyer tricks" to get out of it, claiming that this is a "court of facts". Of course, this is also a court where drugged-up guards maintain order by FiringInTheAirALot, and a guard who is overpowered by an accused is immediately shot by another guard.

* ''Series/FBIMostWanted'': In "Rangeland", the team is called to Wyoming after two Bureau of Land Management agents go missing after trying to execute a cattle seizure warrant against a rancher who hasn't paid the land fees. The rancher, Will, killed the agents claiming that he thought were going for their guns. His brother Cole is involved in an anti-government rancher association and previously ran for Sheriff. The brothers kidnap the Bureau's chief and the Sheriff and put them in a mock trial before his association's ranchers.

* In ''Manga/OnePiece'', Enies Lobby technically serves as a courthouse, even though criminals are only brought through there on their way to the underwater prison Impel Down, or to Marine Headquarters, and has an almost absurd pretense of justice. Criminals are judged by the Just Eleven Jurymen, who are pirates who have been sentenced to death and pronounce any criminal guilty to take as many down with them as they can. Judge Baskerville, [[spoiler: actually three people who sit together to form]] a three-headed man, has a strange way of passing sentences: the left head favors punishing criminals, the right side favors leniency, and the center offers the more extreme "compromise" of execution [[note]]Impel Down is one of those [[FateWorseThanDeath fates worse than death]] so it might be a good compromise from a certain point of view[[/note]]. As such, no criminal has ever been acquitted. Strangely enough, [[spoiler: Nico Robin and Franky]] don't get this treatment when they are taken through Enies Lobby.
** That's actually justified. [[spoiler: Spandam used [=CP9's=] authority to override that.]]