Jury Duty

[Batalov]

I know it's been a while since anyone posted here, but I got the juror duty summons tonight. A couple of times I went because I was curious. (I wasn't needed though. Twice.) Now I just want a legal way out.

Pretending to be dumb is not a good strategy. I'll try being too smart. That is,of course, if I even get called. First I will postpone it for 6 months and transfer it from downtown San Diego to North County. Then I will go and will be sophisticated. I think nobody like smart asses.

I've read the Rosenberg trial minutes. Up to page 100+ (of 2605), the jurors are sill being rotated. "I've just remembered that I am of Czech origin. My father came from there. I think I will not going be able to be impartial."

I don't think the easy way - the one that most Russian immigrants take: "I don't know no English, yur honer" will work for me. Cheating is too easy.

[kladner]

But today, no state would dare pass laws restricting the rights of blacks.

Actually, there is an intense campaign of voter suppression going on in states under Republican control, though these target more than just blacks, and seek to suppress likely non-Republican voters. These include blacks, Latinos, college students, the elderly, and the working poor. The tactics include reducing the number of voting machines available, drastically reducing early voting, especially eliminating the Sunday before an election when traditionally, many black churches would bus their members to the polls, onerous photo ID laws to combat virtually non-existent, in person voter fraud.

Like Stand Your Ground laws, voter suppression laws come from conservative Think Tanks like ALEC, and tend to be supported by some ultra-wealthy persons like Charles and David Koch.

[wblipp]

Originally Posted by Batalov

Now I just want a legal way out.

We are talking about trial jury aka petit jury, right? Just go and be honest and about what you do. In my experience, lawyers from neither side want analytic people on the jury - they want feeling people so they can appeal to your emotions. Engineers and similar seldom get through the voir dire process - I never have.

Grand Jury is a different matter. I'm currently serving on federal grand jury. But it's also an entirely different set of moral issues - one vote doesn't count as much, and you never decide if somebody is guilty - only on whether there is sufficient evidence to go to trial.

[Xyzzy]

…voir dire…

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/Movi...sinvinny4.html

[retina]

Originally Posted by Batalov

I just want a legal way out.

I understand the sentiment but ...

Originally Posted by wblipp

We are talking about trial jury aka petit jury, right? Just go and be honest and about what you do. In my experience, lawyers from neither side want analytic people on the jury - they want feeling people so they can appeal to your emotions. Engineers and similar seldom get through the voir dire process - I never have.

So we are left with juries that a full of people that like to be lazy and are content to sit around hearing male bovine all day? All the smart people -- the ones that can actually make proper thoughtful decisions -- are running away and leaving it to the other emotional "feeling" people.

I know if I was on trial with a jury I would prefer thinking analytical people instead of emotion people that are only responding to my scarred face, fourteen fingers, three arms and two heads, and deciding I am too evil to be free. Okay, I realise the latter folk are probably correct here in my case (but not because of my appearance), but I'd have a better chance against the "brainy" ones. It really hurts my brain to have to type "color" without the "u"! I wish this board would support "colour" also. :(

[Batalov]

It is a petit jury, of course. I (entirely legally) postponed it until October and moved the venue to a county court.

[ewmayer]

Originally Posted by wblipp

We are talking about trial jury aka petit jury, right? Just go and be honest and about what you do. In my experience, lawyers from neither side want analytic people on the jury - they want feeling people so they can appeal to your emotions. Engineers and similar seldom get through the voir dire process - I never have.

"I have no formed views regarding defendants' guilt or innocence, your honor, but I say give him the chair just to scare any would-be baddies straight." (It helps to repeat "the chair! the chair!" several times in a hyper-excited Beavis-style voice ... and if someone actually bothers to correct you by pointing out that the 'lectric chair is no longer used for executions, to ask plaintively "but couldn't we bring it back just this once, for old times' sake?")

Grand Jury is a different matter. I'm currently serving on federal grand jury. But it's also an entirely different set of moral issues - one vote doesn't count as much, and you never decide if somebody is guilty - only on whether there is sufficient evidence to go to trial.

Kinda funny how a GJ is really more petty (in the nonpejorative "petit" sense) than "grand" in all its major aspects, isn't it? (See also the old prosecutor's bromide "I can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich.")

Being a fan of the old 1960ish Perry Mason TV series, an interesting thing there is that the show featured almost 100% GJ settings in which Mason put on artful real-jury-style defenses. Supposedly this allowed the producers to save money by cutting back on expenses related to simulating a full jury trial, but that seems an odd claim to me, since as I noted the affectations and "audience reaction shots" are much more like those one associates with a full-blown trial. But the outcome is (almost) 100% predictable: The real culprit is identified (and invariably spontaneously confesses everything, often closing with a dramatic "and I'd do it again, dagnabbit!") thanks to Perry's out-of-the-box-thinking brilliance, Perry's falsely-accused (and often babe-a-licious) client is exonerated, and dour prosecutor Hamilton Burger ends up with egg on his face. But poor Hamilton, he never stops trying. We admire him for that, even if we don't respect him for his serial-loserness.

[Nick]

Napoleon introduced juries to this part of the world in 1811, and we got rid of them again in 1813 as soon as he was gone.

[wblipp]

Originally Posted by retina

I understand the sentiment but ...So we are left with juries that a full of people that like to be lazy and are content to sit around hearing male bovine all day? All the smart people -- the ones that can actually make proper thoughtful decisions -- are running away and leaving it to the other emotional "feeling" people.

In my experience, it isn't that the thoughtful people are running away. They are being turned away - eliminated through use of the veto in voir dire.