Headed off to Jury Duty yesterday morning just in the nick of time, a satchel full of entertainment with me — a couple of novels, some writing materials, some CoH guides to read, my comic book catalog — and ready to Do My Part.
The local courthouse is over near Centennial airport. I just made it in time, only to be held up by the security checkpoint. Nothing unusual for someone who travels by air.
Checked in, and sat down with a questionnaire. The questions had to do with profession, hobbies, interests, education, jury experience, crime experience, police experience, various bits that the lawyers would usually ask the jury pool but now gets handled this way. One copy goes to the prosecution/plaintiffs, the other goes to the defense. On the bright side, they aren’t allowed to ask any of those questions during jury examination.
Anything additional to say about jury duty, asked the form. “I am interested in doing my civic duty.” Yes, I really am that square.
The waiting room had about 140 people in it — a good cross-section by age and gender and race — and racks of magazines and paperbacks (courtesy of the Arapahoe County Library) along with coffee and tea and various TVs with MSNBC news on it (endless droning on the Schaivo case).
At about 9, the local dury panel deputy person came out and briefed us on the procedure, followed in a bit by one of the local judges welcoming us. Ordinarily, the court there has nine jury trials over the course of a week, a mix of civil and criminal. Things were slow this week, with the one criminal trial on the docket ending late Friday with a plea bargain, leaving a single civil trial.
So, of the 140, a selection of forty was to be made, as selected randomly by computer, the rest dismissed for the day. The selectees then got to see a video, sit through various delays and winnowing and more delays and discussion and delays and …
Well, alas, it was the only day of my “civic duty.” Further deponent sayeth not.
I sometimes hear of trials delayed because there were not enough people coming in for Jury Duty. Then again, I hear of cases like yours where a large number of people wasted a day because the courts managed the jury duty system poorly or because the legal system allows so many delays, postponements, and other nonsense that the court wasn’t ready to use the jurors they had. I have wondered if the courts are not at fault in making people uninterested in Jury Duty by wasting their time.
My one stint on Jury Duty was back in 86 or so. I was an alternate, and the trial lasted several weeks. There were lots of postponements and other nonsense, and lots of time spent marching in and out of the jury room. For me, the biggest frustration and the biggest contributor to the feeling I had wasted my time was the fact that when deliberations started, I had to go off to another room to wait. So I was basically a spectator for the whole time. Intellectually, I understand that I was a ‘backup’, and if a juror had to withdraw, I would have stepped in. But it was still frustrating.
I probably bent your ear about this back when it happened. My apologies for doing it twice.
I sometimes hear of trials delayed because there were not enough people coming in for Jury Duty.
I imagine it has a lot to do with how things are managed, what the legal protections are for employees who are summoned, etc.
In California, used to be that getting deferrals was easy, and employers were under no obligation. Result was that nobody who was employed served, which both underpopulated and skewed the jury pool.
Colorado doesn’t grant easy deferrals (one delay, that’s it), and employers are obligated to pay in full for at least 3 days. It’s not ideal, but it certainly seems to have pulled in enough folks.
Then again, I hear of cases like yours where a large number of people wasted a day because the courts managed the jury duty system poorly or because the legal system allows so many delays, postponements, and other nonsense that the court wasn’t ready to use the jurors they had.
We had 140 people there. About 40 people are pulled in for a given jury pool. There are usually about 3 cases ready to go on a given Monday; in this situation, things were slow, and there were only two cases as of Friday afternoon, and one of those pled out Friday night.
So there were too many people there, but it’s hard to say how it could have been better managed. Especially since, for those who had not delayed service, a phone call or web page review the night before would indicate if they needed to come in.
Now for the 40 selected, procedural delays, questioning, etc., further delayed matters until a final jury (6+1) was identified. It could probably be streamlined further, but one man’s procedural nonsense is another man’s last chance for justice, so …
I have wondered if the courts are not at fault in making people uninterested in Jury Duty by wasting their time.
It was, as best I tell, as reasonable a system as I could see. The majority of the folks were let go by 10 a.m.
I like the idea of the initial questionnaire. Asking those same questions of each member of the jury pool once they are called into the courtroom makes for some very long days in jury selection.
I can imagine.