Well, it’s gone midnight and I’ve just finished up my final proofing edits (why does this always seem to take so long?!) – I would have had them completed much earlier (yeah, right…) if I hadn’t been called up for jury duty last week. Now before you all roll your eyes in sympathy, I was actually excited about the prospect of serving on a jury. In Australia, you see, lawyers (at least when I was practising) are not allowed to serve on juries.
The thought that I was never going to get a glimpse of what it was like to be on the other side – hearing the arguments rather than making them, weighing up the evidence and actually getting to decide whether a person was guilty or not – always bugged me until I realized that now, as a US citizen, I may actually get to be on a jury (I know, it’s sad just how cool I thought this would be).
Last Wednesday was my first ever experience of the American crim
inal justice system (really…) and my first ever jury duty summons as a US citizen, and I have to say it was anticlimactic to say the least.
inal justice system (really…) and my first ever jury duty summons as a US citizen, and I have to say it was anticlimactic to say the least.First off, I had no idea how boring it would be – or how bizarre it was to sit in court listening to people on the first ‘randomly chosen’ jury panel go over their backgrounds, while the rest of us schmucks had to wait…and wait…just in case. I found that I couldn’t turn the lawyer in me off – after each potential juror finished answering their background questionnaire, I found myself mentally deliberating on whether, and on what grounds, I would have tried to excuse them. Every time the judge (who was, I have to say, exceptionally nice as well as funny) issued instructions I also found myself saying ‘yeah, yeah…blah, blah,blah..beyond a reasonable doubt…’ before an inner voice shouted “Just get on with it!!”
As it turned out the case (should I have even ended up on the panel) was due to run through this week and since I’m heading off to London later today (yay!) on a research trip I had to be excused anyway.
So, since my first jury experience turned out to be a bit of a fizzer, I was wondering if anyone had any juicy jury stories to tell me instead. Go on, let me live vicariously…or at least provide me with some truly excruciating, bored to the eyeballs stories so I can feel vindicated.
I’d love to serve on a jury, too, Clare. I’ve picked ’em and I’ve talked to ’em and I’ve trained lawyers how to do the same…but I never get on. So I come home and watch 12 Angry Men and call it a day.
Clare, once again, congrats on becoming a U.S. Citizen. I’ve been called for jury duty many times and served a couple of times. I find it fascinating to watch a portion of life that most of us never get to see. Yes, it’s boring and slow, and nothing like the 1-hour TV courtroom dramas, but a trial by our peers is one of the layers of bedrock on which this country is build. It’s sad that so many people are reluctant to serve and consider those that do to be too stupid to get out of it. And yet, if they are involved in a jury trial, they always insist on 6 or 12 outstanding genius-level citizens on their jury.
I served on my first-ever jury last year, the week before Christmas. I was the only member of the potential jury pool who was hoping to get on the panel–everyone else seemed to be scheming ways to get thrown off. I was impressed by how efficient the process was, once we started hearing the case, which was a grocery-store robbery case.
I wound up being the only “angry man” on the jury–everyone else just wanted to vote and get out of there. I had to push the foreman into reading the judge’s instructions out loud at the start, (the foreman said, “why should I do that, we all heard what the judge said.” Of course, once he read the instructions, they were more complicated than he’d thought). I also had to insist that we deliberate the charges in an organized way, using the whiteboard. The other jurors wanted to simply yak it up,vote, and get out to do Christmas shopping.
I insisted on reviewing every bit of video and portions of the transcript. Some of the jurors were really irritated with me by the end of the deliberations. At one point, when a juror complained that if we reviewed the video evidence, we’d be stuck in the room for four more hours, I said, “I’m prepared to stay for four more hours. I’m prepared to stay for four more days, if necessary.” A little UCLA girl to my right rolled her eyes and said, “I think we grasp that.”
I had everyone so annoyed with me, it cracked me up. But when we came to a unanimous agreement on a lesser charge than robbery, I felt like the defendant had gotten a thoroughly-considered verdict.
I’m envious Kathryn – I so want to be on a jury just to see how the process works and I hope that I will also be the pain in the butt who insists on it being done right! As you say Joe, everyone would want an amazing jury if they were on trial – so how come no one wants to actually be on one? If we didn’t have the jury system think what our world would be like! James, like you, up till now I’ve had to feed my yen for jurydom via DVD…
So far I’m 0-3 for jury duty. Each time I go to serve, they show me the exit sign after learning I once was a cop. Watched the reactions of juries for years as an investigator for the DA, but never got the thumbs up to sit on a jury. Could they fear I might be another Nicholas Easter in Runaway Jury? I can only fantasize.
Closest I came to jury duty was when I got called up for selection in a rape/murder trial. It was the last possible day for the call up of my group. I thought “Wow, this will be interesting.”
As we were going through the selection process the defendant, who happened to be in another room in the courthouse, got into an argument with his lawyer and fired him. The Lawyer stormed out, paused and looked across the room of jury poolees with a look that could best be described as an unspoken gesture of “Burn the creep!”.
Trial was postponed, my jury pool’s time was up and we were all sent home. Someone else got to deal with Mr. Pleasant Personality instead.
My wife on the other hand, while never having served on a jury, has been a court translator several times for both the prosecution and the defense. She came out of those experiences with a firm conviction that she doesn’t want anything to do with court if at all possible.
Never served, only picked . . .
My first attempt at picking a jury was on a domestic battery. Normally wouldn’t put a misdemeanor in front of a jury, but my guy had a dang good alibi.
I was running through the mundane voir dire questions and asked if they knew the defendant or his family.
One said she used to live next door to the defendant’s mother.
So, I followed it up and she suddenly made a vehement, ugly, and highly prejudicial statement about the defendant – totally out of the blue . . .
I was stunned. Absolutely deer-in-the-headlights speechless . . . Remember, this was my first time in front of ‘twelve-in-the-box.’
I ‘for-caused’ her butt out of the jury box ASAP and the judge asked me if I wanted a mistrial. In a strangled voice, I said ‘yes’.
Four hours of jury selection down the drain because of one childish outburst from a prospective juror.
The good news? The prosecutor lost her zeal for my client and took another look at my alibi defense and dismissed. I guess I can say I won my first jury trial.
Terri