I will have to remember that, should I ever be called to jury duty.
Make jokes.
Easier than that. Just show up wearing the wrong kind of T-Shirt or reading one of those cute little New Testaments handed out by the Gideon Society.
Had an old friend in another state. We kept in touch via Facebook (no longer). One Friday he mentioned on FB that he had jury duty on Monday morning and was not really looking forward to it. Another old friend joked about getting out of jury duty and my solution was to just make sure the defendant got a swift and fair trial and then hang him.
Monday morning, he’s seated in the jury box and the judge takes out a piece of paper and asks my old friend if he knew me and the other old friend.
He’s taken aback but says, yes, we’are old friends from high school and we have been in touch the past couple of years via social media.
Haha, the judge says he’s dismissed without further explanation.
Heck, even if you express strong opinions on most anything, you will be dismissed. Lawyers want pliable people with squishy beliefs.
...and make politically incorrect jokes.
The last time I was called for jury duty, they asked me if I was a member of any gun rights organizations. I said yes, the GOA. “What is the GOA?”, the prosecutor asked.
“It is an organization formed because the NRA are a bunch of gutless wimps!”
I was excused.
There is a hardcore grid metal band called Dope Smoker. My kid bought one of their tee shirts at a concert and wore it to jury duty which happened to be for a drug dealer.
‘You’re outta here!’
The only time I have NOT been relieved of jury duty was the one time I did NOT wear my Marine Corps polo. I have a red polo shirt with the Marine Corps emblem in black and gold on the left breast pocket area, and every time they have called my name/number while wearing that shirt I have been dismissed. I’m sure that is just coincidental!
The one time I didn’t wear it, I was an alternate juror on a two-day trial concerning extortion by a lawyer charging exorbitant hours of work, for an UNCONTESTED DIVORCE.
He said he had an office fire...which only happened in his filing cabinet...and that is why he didn’t have exact records of his time/hours worked covering this uncontested divorce. The ex-husband’s lawyer billed his client less than 1/5th of the hours that the plaintiff’s ex-lawyer charged her!
Needless to say, he was found GUILTY, and that is exactly what I would have voted too!
Me = cane cutter, deckhand, roughneck, geologist, consultant, pilot instructor, pharmacist, strict constitutional libertarian. The defense does not want me on the jury of a guilty person.