Sunday, May 6, 2018

Notes on The Justice System

I had Jury duty the other day.  I was pulled from the main jury room and sent off to a court room.

That is better than sitting in the jury room all day and then going home.

It was a civil case.  A young guy caused a car accident.  His car hit a car and that car hit the plaintiff's car.  The plaintiff was claiming injury and wanted a few dollars.  They didn't tell us how much he was  asking.

I've been on a few juries, but never seen a trial.  There was always a settlement before the trial was to start.  One was about a rock group, Third Eye Blind and they had kicked off one of the group and he wanted some money.

The other was in Chicago many years ago.  It was a criminal case.  There were questions about gruesome evidence and torture and kidnapping and such.  We were to start the case the next day.  Of course we all had to come into court and then were told the guy plea bargained for 16 years and 1 day in the slammer.  I've recently run across the reason for the extra day.  For some reason that allows for a much earlier parole possibility.

Ok, so back to modern day Oakland.  They seat an initial jury and there is a questionarre that is passed around and each potential juror answers the questions via a microphone to the court.  The lawyers get to kick off 6 jurors.  Then they add more folks from the pool and we keep going. 

They needed 12 plus one alternate.  They called more folks to join the hot seats.  I was the last of this second set.  When the lawyers used up all their objections, the full jury was seated.  I was left in the alternate spot and there were no others still in the hot seats. 

But, wait!  While they have the jury, they did not have the alternate yet.  They called two more.  They answered the questionnaire.  The lawyers now get one more objection.  The plaintiff used his one objection to send me home!  That's good as Tuesday was a golf day.  Ok, every day that ends in Y is a golf day.  Strangely that is not a valid excuse in this court of law.

I find the whole process quite interesting.  Also my thinking on a lot of how justice is dispensed has changed radically over the years.

I have become quite the fan of "justice theater."  I used to be curious about the idea of profession jurors.  But I think grabbing a bunch of folks and putting on a show and then asking for a verdict is about as good as it is going to be.

I was impressed with this judge, too.  He was friendly and open and seemed to be fairly bright.   Other judges have not impressed me with their logic, personality, nor intelligence.  That was an unexpected bonus.

The other funny thing was that it seemed  that this judge had had some sensitivity training.  No longer is it "foreman" of a jury, but "foreperson."  Also whenever a prospective juror related some history about something that might be relevant to their selection, the judge always said, "Thanks for sharing!"  It reminded me of grade school or some such and not of a gathering of grown ups.

Since auto accidents was part of the case, we were all asked if we had been in any.  It seems that about half the folks there had been rear ended and usually more than once.  And as I thought about it, it's happened to me 3 times.  Thanks for sharing!

So I miss out on the experience for another year.  I'm almost tempted to go in some rainy day and watch a trial. 

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