Jurist Prudence
I got excused from jury duty today. Apparently, at least one of the attorneys prefers not to have people who are too nit-picky when it comes to questioning subtle assumptions. Given that a lot of my work as a technical writer requires me to spot and question assumptions, it’s hard for me to avoid it. After I was dismissed, I had lunch with a friend who happens to be an attorney, and the more I told her about the nature of the case (identifying information left out to protect the presumed innocent), the happier I am that I ended up not being on the jury…mostly because the more I thought about it, the worse things looked for the defendant. When the defense attorney repeatedly stresses (to every prospective juror) that his client doesn’t have to say anything and that the burden of proof is on the prosecutor, it’s not a good sign. I also found out that the reason the judge’s name was so familiar is that she presided over the trial of a nationally-recognized individual several years ago. You’d remember it; trust me.
On the other hand, I did get to watch the recently-released potential-juror motivational video, which for some reason kept stressing that the juror-selection process is totally random. Personally, I would have a lot less trouble believing that if I didn’t consistently get jury duty only within a month of voting for a certain major party in Marion County. Every single time I have voted for that party–jury duty. Voting third-party never lands me jury duty. I haven’t tried voting for the other major party; the spirit of experimentation only goes so far.
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February 23rd, 2004 at 9:23 pm
Ah, the joy of the “least common denominator” approach to “jury of your peers”. One of the many reasons I think our current legal system is, at best, minorly broken.
February 24th, 2004 at 9:23 am
Actually, what probably got me excused was my answer to the prosecuting attorney’s question “If I convince you beyond a reasonable doubt, would you find the defendant guilty?” I said that if the *evidence* convinced me beyond a reasonable doubt, I’d find the defendant guilty. Given the probable situation, I suspect that the defense attorney wanted me out of there in a hurry.