It’s sure easy to understand why so many cases settle. It’s hard to trust a jury after reading some of the comments on this thread. You are asked if you can render a verdict after being instructed in the law and hearing the facts. Your job is not to change the law. That is jury nullification and if that is your belief, you need to disclose it when you are questioned. I bet you would be screaming bloody murder if someone who couldn’t be fair to a minority defendant didn’t disclose that and got on the jury just to influence the rest of the panel.
I got called a few months ago. The judge explained to us that he would dismiss a potential juror because of economic hardship only if the person were a low-income worker paid by the hour, so missing days of work would be a catastrophe for them. He made it clear that other people who would lose income by serving would not be dismissed for that reason.
The jury pool went through jury selection all morning. When we returned after lunch, we waited about an hour, then the judge called us in and said, “I have bad news; the trial will not take place.” He didn’t seem to be joking, I wondered why this would be bad news. Surely if the defendant had taken a plea, that would be thought of as good news. I wondered if there was some sort of prosecutorial error.
I have always thought that the main problem is being “called” to jury duty with no respect for a citizens
commitments. How about telling us that we must serve in such and such a time period (6 months ahead).
We would not schedule trips and figure out how to have our clients or patients covered.
Receiving a notice commanding that we serve has always irked me and it is often just weeks away.
Yes, if it is an honor that show some respect.
Once I was in graduate school and had a major exam and not one that could be made up on a Monday.
I received a notice in the mail on the Friday just before to show up.
Another time I had a trip paid for and received a notice for jury duty one week before and would lose
$ to cancel the trip. I had a limited income and a specific time to travel all planned ahead of time.
One time I received the notice with enough warning and was ok with my privilege.
If there was a system where citizens understood how often the courts needed them to
serve and gave fair warning and even allowed signing up within a period of time I believe attitudes
would be far more positive.
I have wondered how many selected jurors are angry because of the lack of ability to schedule
at a time that suits their family and life.
I was summoned for jury duty for a week that I had already paid to rent a vacation cabin. Fortunately, a woman in my water aerobics class who was a jury supervisor in that county said, “Just send us an email telling us that and we’ll change it.” So I did and they did.
“You are asked if you can render a verdict after being instructed in the law and hearing the facts. Your job is not to change the law. That is jury nullification and if that is your belief, you need to disclose it when you are questioned.”
And even if it’s NOT your belief, say that it is to not be placed on the jury, right?
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/21257573/#Comment_21257573
^^^ Not sure what your point is CTTC. Yes, believing in jury nullification would certainly get you off. I didn’t advocate lying. Look- no lawyer wants angry jurors on the panel and jurors who are missing bunco to serve. Some jurisdictions are more accommodating than others as far as other commitments. I have never heard of people having to cancel trips or surgeries for jury duty in the places where I have lived.
@MomofWildChild Same here. I have a relative on the jury commission. They are very accommodating and as long as you are polite when calling them to explain your situation and make it clear you want to reschedule not just try to get out of it they will work with you.
Unfortunately more people call with an attitude and try to come up with an excuse to be excused. That never goes well. There are very very few excuses to get you excused.
@MomofWildChild , You are mistaken in thinking that I don’t understand the system. I do understand it perfectly well. But I think that selecting a “death qualified” jury is inherently packing the jury with people who are in fact innately prejudiced. I think it is obscene.
Before you pull the minority card, consider how many of those “death qualified” juries have sentenced innocent minorities to death, or simply sentenced far more minority individuals to prison for equal crimes than whites. The stats are out there. I’d say that death penalty opponents are the least of our worries as regards the judicial system.
And bear in mind that we are not talking about people who are reluctant to listen and deliberate with an open mind and find the person guilty and recommend life in prison, if warranted.
BTW, I said that I had thought about the ethics of the situation. I didn’t say that I would DO it.
I agree that most are happy around here to reschedule you, as long as you’re polite. Lying is very bad and unfair to all.
The jury duty situation is just awful where I live. You are only exempt from jury duty for 12 months after you serve. Only 25% of people called show up for jury duty, on average, so if you ever serve, they keep calling you over and over. The ones that don’t show up are just crossed off the list. From what I have been told, there are too many people to prosecute/fine, so they just don’t bother. How’s that for encouraging civil responsibility?
I have been called four times. DH has never been called. I am a SAHM home schooling mom who did foster care (drug addicted/affected infants/toddlers) for many years.
The first time I was called, years ago, they excused me because I had 3 children under school age and I was the primary caregiver. I wasn’t trying to get out of it; they just asked me.
The second time I mentioned that I had a foster child I would need to find a state approved respite worker to watch, and they excused me on the spot.
The third time I had another foster child, so I assumed I could just tell them and they would excuse me. No, apparently the rules had changed and now being a primary caregiver didn’t matter.
I just got called again about 12 months ago. I was scheduled to serve the first week of DH’s new job. He would have to arrange to start the following week and would have to stay home without pay while I served. When I explained that to the clerk, she huffily said she would put me back in the pool, but that she was making a note that I had “used an excuse” to get out serving, and would not be allowed any more excuses, AND that I could expect a summons exactly 12 months from that time (how’s that for random).
I told her that if they would just call my husband, there would be no problem. He could serve with much more ease, plus he would get paid according to state law. Her response? “We call women twice as much as men. The lawyers would rather have women, especially ones who don’t work. Plus, women tend to show up more than men do.”
My D, who goes to school out of state, got called 3 days after that phone conversation. She spent her entire spring break on jury duty.
Like I said, it has been almost exactly 12 months. I’m expecting that summons any time now.
If you feel the death penalty is wrong, the way to change that is not through being on a jury but though the legislature. Join groups that fight it.
@twoinanddone , I agree that activism is necessary for judicial reform in general. It’s not only the death penalty, it’s for-profit prisons, mass incarceration, and any number of related issues.
So, what do you think about the ethics of selecting for a death-qualified jury in a capital case? Not simply a jury willing to deliberate fairly and come to a guilty verdict if appropriate? For pushing to kill the defendant before they have even stood trial? Is that prosecutarial over reach? Doesn’t this bother anyone else besides me and @garland ?
I’ve never heard of a death-qualified jury before this thread. I don’t like the sound of that at all. 
The jurors have to be willing to apply the law. If you are unable to sign a death sentence, you will be excused.
But MOWC, isn’t the death penalty normally only ONE of the possible sentences? Isn’t it “applying the law” to agree to any of the others? Are there situations where the law requires a death sentence? Isn’t it a matter of discretion in most cases as to whether the prosecutor asks for it?
My mom was dismissed eons ago for saying she didn’t think she could assign a monetary number in an insurance case.
Our system exempts students residing out of county.
We can put off jury duty if the time isn’t convenient. You just fill in the date (week) you can serve and send it back. There used to be many more automatic excuses than there are now. You haven’t “served” unless you actually have to show up at the court house. So you can get jury summons over and over (I’m the lucky one). We call in for a week and wait for “your number to come up”. If you re-schedule you’re a definite to go to the court house so sometimes it’s just better to take your chances (unless you’ve got very definite plans).
I honestly don’t mind serving–it’s just the randomness of it. I’d almost rather call them and say “Hey! I got a free week with not much going on. Can I come over?”
I agree that the randomness makes it hard to fit into our busy lives. Wish there were a better system that was a bit less random and gave more flexibility due to folk’s scheduling constraints.
I have never served in a serious criminal case, but agree that all jurors have to be willing to apply the law given to them to the facts presented. That is their job.
I had a co-worker who was selected for a high profile murder trial. She served for over six weeks, part of that sequestered in a hotel.
Not the norm, of course, but you can’t know that in advance.
Yes, there are some very long trials that can take up a good chunk of time—weeks and yes, even months in complicated cases. For longer cases, they generally start with a much larger pool because they want to be are all the jurors and alternates will be available for the entire trial AND deliberations.
True. Never know what’s on the agenda. You could get stuck for awhile…
I sometimes wonder though if it would make that much difference to have a group of people who have time and volunteer to serve or have a group who just want it “over and done with”.