<p>I do not know of anyone that has received a summons for jury duty more than me. Most people I know have never received a summons. I have received the questionaire and have been on “call” at least 10 times in my life. I’ve now lost track. I’ve gone to court three or four times for questioning. I served on a jury once a couple of years ago. This was all through county courts. </p>
<p>Yesterday I received a questionaire from the Federal District Court system. I still can’t believe it. A jury duty summons–again! I’m sure I’ll receive a letter later telling me the dates I need to be available. I can’t honestly answer any of the questions in a way to make me ineligible. The only time I was excused was when I was nursing my then infant son. (The court wasn’t too fond of the idea of a mother stopping the proceedings to feed her baby I guess.) </p>
<p>Has anyone here served on a Federal District Court jury before? What should I expect? </p>
<p>Has anyone else been summoned this many times? If my luck at being randomly drawn in the lottery was similar to my luck in jury duty random selection, I would probably be very wealthy by now.</p>
<p>rrah, while I have only been summoned once, my husband has been summoned 3 times. Just yesterday DD1 received a summons (first one). She in in her first year of physical therapy and her program requires a doctor’s excuse to miss class. In your experience, have students been excused from jury duty?</p>
<p>You may simply one of the “lucky” ones. I’ve been called four or five times. DW has never been called. D was called two months after registering to vote. Go figure.</p>
<p>I’ve been called three times. Twice for the county, once for federal. (The latter would have been the Martha Stewart trial.) Never actually had to be on a jury though.</p>
<p>hoosiermom - The jury office here in CT was unsympathetic, even though D attends college OOS. “Well when will she be back?” Thanksgiving Break. “We’ll schedule her then.” But what if she gets picked for a jury? Finals are right after Thanksgiving Break. “Well she’ll just have to miss Finals then, won’t she.” Sheesh. (And no, I’m not at liberty to say how I got this resolved.)</p>
<p>I wasn’t called for about 25 years, but I’ve been called every 3 years for the last nine. I think I got on their radar when I changed party affiliations.</p>
<p>I don’t know if all federal districts operate the same way, but here if you’re on federal jury duty, you call each morning by a certain time and they tell you if you have to show up that day.</p>
<p>My husband has never been called. I’ve been called twice for county jury duty, once was when I had a one-month old I was nursing and didn’t have to report. The other was recently where I had to go every day for a week. I didn’t get picked for a trial though.</p>
<p>My recently graduated son has been called twice. Once he had to report for jury duty in his college town. Luckily they let him reschedule for a time when he was in town but not in class. He only had to go twice. He also received a notice from our home county about 2 months after graduation, when he’d already moved and was working out of state. When I explained this they took him off the list.</p>
<p>over30–Thanks for the info. I hope the court here allows you to call the night before. Our county court did it that way. The federal court is about 75-90 minutes from our house so I need a bit more notice. </p>
<p>Hoosiermom–I was called twice as a student. I did have to report both times but was dismissed. Since your daughter would be breaking the law by not reporting, I believe the physical therapy program will have to accept this excuse. She can get a letter from the person in charge of juries for those days and can show her summons letter to the instructors. I’m sending you a dm with a little more personal info.</p>
<p>That sounds like a lot. In my whole life, I never knew anyone in my family who was called for jury duty, but when we moved to the town we now live in, H & I were both called as well as everyone who works in my office. Only H had to serve for 2 trials over a two-week period. I was able to postpone appearing for about a year because I travel frequently for my job and there was no one who could take my place. Finally, they wouldn’t let me postpone anymore and told me to appear and tell the judge. It so happened that I was president of a national association that was meeting during those two weeks. As president, I had to chair the meeting. I had to stay the whole day to find out I was excused.</p>
<p>If you’re there, I think it very much depends on the judge. There was a woman who owned a small store. She had to close her store to serve, and what she received for jury service was certainly not going to cover her loss.</p>
<p>There were all county, although one of my secretaries served on a federal jury.</p>
<p>DH was called and went ready to serve, but was not selected. S1 is in the Border Patrol and it was a drug related illegal alien trial. They sent him home right away :)</p>
<p>rrah-- that stinks! There should almost be a limit on how many times one person can be called to serve. It’s almost the type of thing they sometimes run on ‘troubleshooters’ spots on the news. It would certainly be a good story for a regional paper.</p>
<p>I was called to jury duty for the first time ever this year; my husband has never been called.</p>
<p>This is civil court, I’m in a jury pool for one year and am done if I serve three trials. I’ve sat on one trial so far. The judge is very lenient – if you just say you’re out of town during a trial, she lets you go. She let a bunch of people off for deer hunting (I kid you not – suddenly a lot of people decided they were deer hunters). Another guy got off because he was picking up his daughter from college the day of the trial.</p>
<p>Then, there was the person who refused to say the oath (and made sure we all knew it) and announced she believes everyone is guilty, trials aren’t necessary and everyone belongs in jail. And the guy who said he thinks all accident damage awards are too high, raising health insurance costs, trial lawyers are a bunch of opportunist crooks, etc. </p>
<p>I think almost everyone in this pool had never been called for jury duty before. Maybe they changed the computer algorithms. </p>
<p>My sympathies, rrah. I know people who don’t register to vote to avoid being called.</p>
<p>I have been summoned at least three times the past two decades in my county. My husband of all that time, who has the same voting history, has never been summoned. </p>
<p>The first time I was excused because of having a young child. The second time I served, I was placed on a (drunk driver) trial the first day, and absolutely loved the experience! The judge was great and met with the jury members to answer any questions we had after the trial. I very much enjoyed getting to know my fellow panel members.</p>
<p>They must have realized that I was enthusiastic about the process, because I got called again as soon as I was again eligible to serve. It was an inconvenient time and I was able to reschedule that for a future date and will be serving again this summer.</p>
<p>I have been called about eight times and made the jury six of those times. My H has been called about half of that. As matter of fact he has jury dury in two weeks. All of mine has been county, he was called once to federal.</p>
<p>The system here is supposed to be set up to where you would be called no more than once every two years. They are trying to achieve an optimal mix of ages and sexes, because of this some people may be in a group that is larger and not called as frequently. Most of my jury duty was in my 20s and 30s and only once since my 40th birthday.</p>
<p>Gosh, hearing this, I think I must be targeted more than you. In the past 10 years, I’ve been summoned to show up for jury duty with the county court at least 6 times, and for the city’s traffic court 3 times. The system here is you must show up and wait around to see if you are needed on a panel. If not, you can go home. They don’t have a “call ahead” system. However, if you are a part-time or full-time student, you are eligible for an exemption. There must be a better system!</p>
<p>Is this right? My kid will most likely be going to school out of state. Can he really get put on jury duty over a break and be expected to miss finals/classes?</p>
<p>I’ve never been called anywhere I’ve lived, and neither has my H or my parents or sister or any other member of my family, as far as I know. All of us have always been registered to vote.</p>
<p>The army did try to draft my mother when I was kid, though. That was bizarre.</p>
That doesn’t work (not in my state anyway). I am not a US citizen so can’t register to vote. I got called for jury duty once. I wasn’t actually eligible because I am not a citizen so, after a phone call querying it, I was told not to show. My husband was called once when he was seriously ill in hospital and we were not sure he would survive. A phone call sorted that out too, though it was a hassle I did not want to have to deal with at the time. I think he was called a second time and had to report to the court on the monday for a few weeks but was never selected.</p>
<p>My husband is called like clockwork every year. Some years he just calls and never has to appear. He has been on at least 4 cases. One lasting almost 2 months. I have only been called twice. Once to Federal court which is 2 hours away. At the time I had an elementary age child who needed me to take her to school. Since we live a 45 minute walk with no bus service or sidewalks I was excused. Last year I was called for the superior court and had to appear 1 morning for about 2 hours. The case was settled at the last minute before going to trial and we were released and can not be called for another year.</p>
<p>I think PA has changed from voter registration to other methods of acquiring jurors (driver’s licenses maybe?)</p>
<p>pugmadkate, it probably depends on your court system. I know my sister was able to schedule her jury duty over winter break from classes because of her teaching schedule. I think if it looks like you are trying to cooperate, rather than get out of it completely, they may be more sympathetic.</p>