Jury Duty (Long and boring). . .

I understand we want openminded jurors. But this cannot be done allowing a partisan person to take part in the jury selection. Only a neutral person, by definition, can select a neutral juror. Certainly a form could be devised that asks appropriate and relevant questions and the judge can then follow up with additional questions.


The attorneys are not attempting to weed out biased jurors. They're attempting to weed out jurors who are biased against them. They desire jurors who are biased so long as they are biased in their favor. The defense attorney, on the day I was dismissed (the judge did not like my ideas about circumstantial evidence, but that's a whole 'nother story), was not even listening or watching any of the potential jurors being questioned, he spent the whole afternoon looking back over his shoulder to see who was still left in the room. He objected to every white male without listenting to what they said; there were still 4-5 black females left in the pool.


One potential juror was an attorney. She did not handle criminal cases. The defense attorney asked her who she had more admiration for, Gerry Spence or Kenneth Starr. This is relevant? I was asked if I had ever handled a gun before [the victim was killed by a gun--I'm not making this up, HDPM. According to Professor Bellesiles, it happens fairly often [img]/images/smile.gif[/img]]. This is relevant? Does one need to be a chicken to recognize an egg?


By the way, here was the timing on my second day. We reported at 9:15; judge ambled in at 9:45. Sidebar until 9:55. Morning break at 10:30. Called back in at 10:50. Judge comes in at 11:00. Lunch at 12:00. Thus there was an hour and 3/4 of work in the morning.


Back from lunch at 1:30. Judge comes in at 1:40. Afternoon break at 3:00. Called back in at 3:25. Close down at 4:15. Two hours and ten minutes worth of work in the afternoon for a grueling 3 hour and 55 minute work day.


"I just think a lot of cases are too important to not let litigants have a say in jury selection"


-I would argue just the opposite, for the same reason we don't let the players shuffle the cards We need a neutral party dealing to assure an unbiased hand.

What neutral party would ask? What party is necessarily neutral? I have a lack of confidence in all the people in the criminal justice system because I have seen bad people in all the positions. But in most cases the system works OK somehow. Our system is designed to be adversarial, so you let the parties fight it out. (Prosecutors aren't supposed to get completely caught up in the fight, but that's easier said than done sometimes.) Anyway, I just don't know who you would have doing the picking. And believe me, I wouldn't trust a judge to do it.


BTW, what could you have said about circumstantial evidence that the judge didn't like? Did you mention your crappy anti-gun book in court? [img]/images/smile.gif[/img]

Capital punishment is a well known detergent to crime...I split my gut...man, that Bunker....most memorable television character there ever was .. by far...

Who would be this neutral party? And how would you ever get such a neutral party to take this job seriously? Who would pay for his services? etc etc.


It's an adversarial system. A Lawyer no doubt will have no interest in dumping jurors who appear to be biased for his client's cause...but that's okay because it's the other guy's job to make sure that this fella doesn't get into the box.


The system is not perfect but it's plenty good.


That said, it's unfortunate that you had such a bad experience what with all the apparent wasted time etc. Like I said, That's never happened before in the trials that I have run. Perhaps, this was an isolated aberration. If not, the particular courthouse that you were in should probably look at revamping their systems and procedures.

No one is surprised that you got worked over.

"Who would be this neutral party?"


The judge. He could get the job done if he worked a six-hour day, or, heaven forbid, an eight-hour day.


"Perhaps, this was an isolated aberration."


I hope so, but I doubt it. My dad practiced family law for many years and then was director of the Beverly Hills Bar Association for 12 years. Before I reported, he told me that the biggest problem is that nobody works a full day and a five minute thing usually takes three hours. How true.


By the way, I was entitled, in addition to the $15.00 per day, 15 cents a mile for travel reimbursement. I live 2 miles from the courthouse, so I will get travel reimbursement of 90 cents (they pay only for one-way travel, apparently not realizing you have to travel both ways). They told us that is costs them $2.50 to make out a check, so if we could forego the travel reimbursement, it would save the taxpayers a lot of money.


I wanted to do this. When I told them so, I was handed a double-sided form that it would have taken me another 15 minutes to fill out. I'm taking my 90 cents.

"What neutral party would ask?"


The judge. I have more confidence in his ability to be impartial than than the attorneys, who are, by virtue of representing one side or the other in an adversarial process, not impartial.


I told the judge that I did not believe in circumstantial evidence, that evidence was either evidence or it was not. At the beginning, he tried to explain to us what circumstantial evidence was by 1) dropping a pencil on the ground in front of us; this he called direct evidence; and 2) apparently dropping the pencil on the ground behind his desk. We heard the pencil hit the ground, but then he told us it was a trick, he had actually dropped another pencil. This he called circumstantial evidence.


This I called lack of evidence. Since the original pencil had not actually hit the ground, the circumstantial evidence that it had was not evidence at all, but rather an educated, and incorrect, guess. I told the judge I would not make an educated, and therefore possibly incorrect, guess about whether or not a man had committed a murder. Thank you for your candor, Mr.Fox, you are excused.


Since we were all asked whether or not we had ever handled a gun, I was holding my crappy anti-gun book as my ace-in-the-hole, in case my circumstantial evidence argument failed.

"most memorable television character there ever was .. by far..."


I agree. I've been watching the old shows the last few weeks. The other night was an episode where Edith is going through menopause. I remember laughing hysterically when I first saw it, and I laughed just as hard this time.


I remember how shocking the show was when it first came on. Archie belched, went to the bathroom, and was bigoted. Carol O'Connor, nevertheless, had to make this character likeable to the public, and he obviously succeeded. Probably the most important show in the history of television.

Court here begins at 10 am. We break at 11 for 15 minutes and then go till 12:30. We then go from 2 to 3 and break for 15 minutes. We finish between 3:15 and 4 pm.


That's 4 hours of testimony.


Lay persons generally think that this is a short workday...NOT!


I can tell you that my timesheets during a week when I am in trial invariably has 12 plus hours on it per day. That's just billable time which means that I am probably in the office for 13 or 14 hours. It's hard work to prepare for 4 hours of testimony. If actual court time were to be 6 hours per day, I literally would not be able to get any ZZZZ's whatsoever during the trial week. Furthermore, just because I am doing for a trial for John Doe does not mean that my other clients' work gets put off...they continue to expect that things will be attended to on their files.


As well, appaering in court is a stressful experience for most witnesses and it's simply not possible for them to remain focussed enough to give testimony for longer than 4 hours in a day.


Judges also do not have it easy in terms of absorbing testimony for longer than 4 hours. Oh...and I doubt very much that the judge's day is over at 4 pm or that it only starts at 10 am. In addition to presiding over trials, they also have other duties such as writing reasons for judgment, appearing in chambers in the morning to hear interlocutory applications or pretrail conferences in other matters, continuing legal education so that they are up to date on the law etc etc. In a jury trial, the most common grounds of appeal relate to the judge's charge to the jury. Preparing that charge also takes time and has to be done under trying circumstances i.e. when all the evidence is in and the judge has no more than a few hours or perhaps overnight to consider and draft his charge to the jury.


Andy, believe me bud, lawyers in general are overworked. I post a lot here. I do so because it breaks the monotony of work but I make up for the lost time by invariably coming in to the office either on Saturday or on Sunday and sometimes both days. If I could do it all over again, I wouldn't pick law. The hours you put in are too much.