Posted on 03/14/2017 10:40:20 AM PDT by blueunicorn6
I recently had the opportunity to fulfill my civic duty.
I gave Al Franken an Atomic Wedgie.
No.....just kidding. Though I do think that every American should pull Al Franken's shorts over his head.
I was called for jury duty.
They sent me an engraved invitation with a veiled threat to kick my donkey if I didn't show up at the appointed time.
The invitation said to wear "appropriate clothing", and I was going to the jury pool, so I tried to check in wearing my speedo and flip flops.
Turns out there's some kind of dress code to try out for the jury team, so I had to go home and change.
When I returned with my appropriate attire, they had me sign in and go and sit in an oven. It was roasting in the jury room. All 70 or 80 of us potential jurors were jammed into a room not much larger than a dorm room.
Some of us potential jurors had thought ahead and brought things to entertain us while we waited.
I brought some dice.
I won four cell phones and a pair of socks. Hey! Winning is winning.
They called us and we left the sauna for the cool and relaxing court room.
Thus began the traditional legal practice of "void dire" which I guess is French for "tired butt" because we sat for quite awhile.
I had very low expectations of the Judge and the lawyers. I am happy to say that I was really wrong about them. They were competent and considerate. I was pleased with everyone in the court room except for one group.
My fellow potential jurors.
Oh my God.
The lawyers ask the potential jurors questions to try and determine if they will be fair.
The lawyers aren't going to look you in the eye and ask you if you are a dirty liar.
They probably should have.
Of course, they would have had to send out for more jurors and all lawyers want to run for political office someday so they try not to embarrass anyone.
They ask a lot of hypothetical questions.
For example, the lawyer might ask, "Let's say you find a dead chicken in your yard and you see fox tracks but the fox says he didn't do it.....would you believe the fox?"
Well, I've talked to a lot of foxes and I know that they'll say anything to stay out of trouble, so I said as long as we were making shirt up that I would just ask my talking dog if he knew who killed the chicken.
That was the last question they asked me.
But, oh, how my fellow potential jurors spilled their guts.
We found out that one had a communicable disease. Another told us about her love life which was pretty boring. I kid you not, there was a lady who raised her hand four times to comment that she wasn't sure if she could be fair or not, but she thought she could be.
When she raised her hand for the fifth time, the Judge dismissed her.
I have recently discovered this new thing called "Virtue Signaling". It's basically where you're trying to impress everyone with what a good person you are. We had lots of Virtue Signaling.
You couldn't swing a dead cat in that group of jurors without hitting someone who felt the desperate need to tell the Judge and lawyers and fellow potential jurors how virtuous they were.....the dirty liars.
And ladies, I'm sorry to tell you, but probably 95% of the Virtue Signaling was done by females. They would recite the Girl Scout Oath and tell everyone they lived by it. We had sworn an oath to be truthful and these women were trying to convince everyone that they were Mother Theresa or a reasonable facsimile.
I started looking for Angels wings.
I guess they really wanted to be a juror. Me, I could take it or leave it. I figured my talking dog comment had probably caused both lawyers to pull the black ball on me.
We had one lady who just had to talk. She told us about movies she had seen. She told us about her friends and family. She told us about her ethnic heritage.
Finally, I could take no more.
I stood up and pointed at her and yelled, "For crying out loud, your Honor, can you give this woman the death penalty right now and save the rest of us?"
I was excused. Chatty Kathy is on the jury.
No doubt that this is what her attorney was shooting for - he even said so.
The jury foreman, however, was insane and we wasted hours listening to his conspiracy theories of how she was set up, the evidence was planted, etc. It was a very strange and frustrating experience, and I’d hate to have someone like this guy on the jury if I was on trial.
I was on jury duty once, in San Diego. I was an alternate. First degree murder. He killed a homeless guy during a robbery. All of the witnesses had to have an interpreter. What amazed me was the information that was not given. I was surprised they allowed me to serve. The crime scene was a location I passed every day on the trolley. The judge told me not to look at it. They used drawings to show the where/how of the crime and they were not at all accurate. The guy was guilty as can be and was convicted, death penalty.
:)
Similar hilarity going for jury questioning last week in Orlando. Armed robbery case. They brought in 40 of us to question. I’d estimate 18 of 20 didn’t speak English as a first language. 4 or 5 barely spoke any English.
Most of the rest were just idiots, sadly. Answering questions that weren’t asked, going on tangents of all kinds. I was in the front row when I hear someone snoring. The black dude wearing sweat pants behind me was doubled over in the pew, sound asleep.
You see, you can’t look at your phone in the courtroom so the idiot couldn’t stay awake! He was awake outside the courtroom.
Finally, the perp was sitting right in front of me. Maybe 15 feet away. Little bitty black guy, but really cut, tatted up, dread locks going every which away, hadn’t been washed in forever. I could just tell he was guilty. (wink)
In the end, the attorneys could not agree on 12 potential jurors out of me and my 39 “peers” so they sent all of us home.
LOL
Also if you threaten to crucify the defendant you can get out of jury duty. Don’t ask me how I know.
Served on a jury all last week.
Got there Monday at 8:20 but of course it was over a hour later that we got to go up to the court room. Would get a few 10-15 minute breaks and got a hour for lunch. They would send some home after almost every break. At 4:45 the one attorney finally shut up and let the defense guy ask us questions. At 5:30 he was done and we were sent to dinner until 6:35. Didn’t get back in until 7:05, 5 minutes later 14 of us were called and then sworn in and sent home and told to show up at 9 am.
3 days of testimony and several witnesses. It was a medical malpractice lawsuit. On Friday they did closing and we were sent to deliberations just before noon. We took a short break first. When we got back one guy said he would be foreman if no one else wanted to be. He decided to take a vote to see where we all stood. It was 9-2-1 and we could have went back then but we decided to be fair and try to change minds and took two more votes. Both were 10-2 for the defendant. Got out about 12:40.
We were told we could opt out for the rest of our term but I didn’t.
—
This is an old court house. Has one bathroom for women and handicapped men. The other men have to go outside and to the basement. 10 women and 4 men on the jury with a few smokers so our breaks always ran longer.
“You see, you can’t look at your phone in the courtroom so the idiot couldn’t stay awake! “
I’d be like that, too; take medication for daytime somnolence but it doesn’t always work. Also need to pee every 15-30 minutes. Sometimes just stay in the restroom for a couple hours after lunch. Figure it’s better for the court, the other jurors and even the defendant if I pass on the civic obligation. If I ever find myself as defendant? — they’ll drop charges due to inability to provide a speedy trial what with all the delays.
I was on a jury once where a lady had presented with flu symptoms at a hospital emergency room. Was treated and sent home to check with her regular doc. She died about 3 days later. Family was sueing doc for millions. Instead of settling he was fighting it.
Their whole argument was that he didn’t do an x ray and if he had he would’ve found what was wrong with her. Don’t remember what it was. Almost everyone on the jury had been to a doc with flu symptoms and had never been x rayed so guess you can guess what our verdict for the doc was.
I’ve been on quite a few juries. Father in law was Chief Investigator for our DA’s office and I worked at our biggest country club. Knew quite a few of the judges and attorneys in town and the father in law knew them all. When they got to the part where......is anyone in your family in law enforcement and/or do you know anyone in the courtroom the judge and attorneys would all laugh and say hi to me. Then they chose me every single time!
Just wear a TRUMP MAGA Hat.
They probably won’t let you get past the Metal Detectors in the Courthouse.
Bring a book on jury nullification. Gets you off every time
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