Jury Duty

Yep, yours truly got summoned for Jury Duty yesterday in the local District Court and had to appear by 9 am,

This led to some complications, as I had a Zoom motion set in another court yesterday morning at, you guessed it, 9am. A bit of a scramble, but I had an attorney friend cover it.

So I got to the Court and headed down to the jury assembly room, checked in and sat around for quite awhile.

I likely could have done the Zoom motion myself as nothing went on until past 10am. 

We then watched the jury film which gives some basics as to what the juror's role is in the justice system, which I kinda already had down pat.

At 10 am we headed up to the Courtroom.

The judge, who I had practiced in front of before,  and for whom I have considerable respect -- she's the very definition of tough but fair-- was very cordial and informative with the jurors.

The jury selection process began. 

We were introduced to the parties and everyone indicated they did not know them.

We found out the case was domestic violence, in this case a girl on girl assault -- allegedly. 

The first 7 jurors were drawn and questioning began. Questions included employment; to if anyone or their relatives were in law enforcement; if anyone had been a victim of a crime; if anyone had served on a jury before; and similar questions so the parties could get a feel for the jurors.

One juror indicated she would try to be fair as she had been assaulted previously. When asked by the judge if she could definitively be fair she said yes

She was preemptively challenged by the defense, thanked for her service, and another juror chosen from the pool to replace her. Very good call on the Defense attorney's part.

Another juror was chosen and the Defense counsel stated, once he found out the persons name, that his kids went to school with her kids (it was a very distinctive name) even as they don't personally know each other.  Good disclosure but all sides decided it was not an issue as they didn't actually know each other and had no bias either way.

2 more jurors got preemptively challenged and were replaced, and I wasn't randomly selected for either spot.

Probably for the best, as it was highly likely I would be preemptively challenged off by either or both sides if I had been selected.

I, and the rest of the jury pool, were then released and I got on with what became a very full day.

Very instructive to watch the process from the jury pool side of the bar, which will certainly be useful when I next do a jury trial.