Jury Duty 101 - part 1

Last year, right about this time, I was called to jury duty for the first time. Eager to be a good citizen (and get out of work for a day), I made the trip downtown to federal court. I didn't know what to expect, and much of what I learned from the experience was not at all what I was hoping for. More on that later.

Yesterday, I was called upon AGAIN for jury duty. This time, I was sent to my local district court. Some people go their whole lives and never get called once, let alone twice in a year, to do their "duty." I'm just that lucky, I guess. If you're unfamiliar with the jury duty process, please allow me to explain...

Step one - You get a letter in the mail ordering you to appear at your local or federal court on a set date and time approximately two months in the future. The letter goes on to say that if you don't show up, you'll be in big, BIG trouble.

Step two - You show up on the aforementioned date, and are directed to a cage in the court house, where you will be chained and forced to sit in an extremely uncomfortable silence with a whole bunch of crazies ("crazies" are of course the other citizens who were randomly selected to appear for jury duty).

Step three - Once the uncomfortable silence turns into pure torture, and your shackles become unbearable, a clerk will wander in and begin registering everyone. As part of the registration, you get a number branded on your chest. I was Juror #17. When the branding iron cools, the clerk then explains a whole bunch of shit to everyone about the rest of the process.

Step four - At this point, you are either randomly separated into large groups and sent to a courtroom, or you are already there, and another clerk or courtroom assistant will appear and explain even more shit to you. Or, if your lucky, the judge will grace you with his/her presence and do the additional bunchofshit-explaining.

Step five - The lawyers and hooligans, sorry, "defendants" enter the court room at this point, and the 11 or 7 panel jury box is filled by yet another random drawing from the pool of crazies.

And this is where the fun begins...

Step six - The prosecuting attorney, who works for the government, and the defense attorney, who works for his/her client, begin asking each juror a number of annoying, prying questions. These questions are asked under the guise of determining whether or not they believe you can judge the case in an unbiased manner. In reality, though, the attorneys are trying to pick the biggest suckers who they think they can sway to side with them on the case at hand. Race, age, and other "illegal" determining factors play a huge role in the process, even though no one will ever admit it. If they choose, they can dismiss any juror and start the whole process over with a new sucker from the cage of crazies. In some federal cases, this questioning/dismissal dance can go on FOREVER, because there they may not be a limit on the number of jurors that can be dismissed. What makes this step so much darn fun, though, is that you get to sit there and learn a whole bunch of weird, f'd up personal shit about the other jurors (you're under oath at this point). Out of respect for other people's privacy, let's just say... HOLY CRAP my life is great compared to most of the general population, who's lives are plagued with ignorance and misfortune. Jesus H! No wonder this country has issues... most of it's "people" are freakin morons!

Step seven - If you were selected for the jury, and smart enough to accept your fate and keep your mouth shut (dismissed jurors are held onto for other cases, or can be called on at any time in the very near future to serve again), a date for the trial is then set. Sometimes, the trial begins immediately, or, like in my case, not for a while.

Step eight through eighty - We'll cover the rest of the steps in March, when I return to jury duty. I can't give everything away all at once, ya know.

For now, I will offer the following observations:

• It is true, what you see in movies and on the TV... defense attorneys are total sleeze bags. They talk out of both sides of their mouths, and look like someone's creepy uncle that no one talks to anymore.
  
• Prosecuting attorneys are the exact opposite... well dressed, attractive, direct, and they don't take any shit from anyone.
• Dependents who look guilty, usually are guilty... especially when they're wearing a brand-new sweater from Kohl's to make themselves appear presentable.

As an appendix to my tale, I'll describe a few of my fellow jurors to you: First, there was the elderly gentlemen who looked EXACTLY like Santa Claus, couldn't hear very well, and thought that he "probably needed a hearing aide but couldn't afford one." Next, was the dirty, stinky, frazzled old guy that smelled like a corpse who'd been smoking cigars for breakfast, lunch, and dinner since the 3rd grade (I ended up sitting near him, of f'n course). Then, there was the adult ADD lady who munched on her raspberry breakfast bar like a squirrel and tapped her foot INCESSANTLY. Next, there was the young man in the back who, unfortunately, had part of his head shaved for some sort of medical procedure, but wasn't allowed to wear his hat because the prick bailiff made him take it off. Oh, and how could I forget the guy with half-a-finger, or the guy who was worried that he didn't understand all the words in the English language... even though he had been in this country since 1985?!

Ahh, March cannot come soon enough!