Monday last I was at the courthouse, in a room with 80 people, most of whom didn't want to be there. On the upside there were cookies, and buy 1lb. get 1 lb. free certificates for fudge from a local company. This was, you see, juror appreciation week. SLO County was kind enough to demonstrate this by sending us across town to the secondary court and telling us we weren't actually needed until Tuesday, because the jury questionaire wasn't here. I was amused because the judge told us this was a once in a lifetime thing, and we'd forget all about it. This was the second time I'd had this happen.
My first call-up I was supposed to be in Ukraine, and they just told me to forget about it. My second, there were about 125 people in a room meant for fifty. The computer had goofed and called a week's worth of jurors for one day. Those of us who weren't supposed to be there were told today didn't count, and we weren't going to be paid if we were called in again. So I was called in the next day, and sat around for eight hours and wasn't called to be on a panel. In the last five minutes they called for fifteen, and I wasn't one of them.
Me, I wanted to be on a jury. I've always wanted to be on a jury. Being in the pool of potential jurors was as strong a motivation to register to vote as voting was.
With 80 people I figured the odds were slim. Then the judge said the trial was looking at being four weeks long. My guess was that about half the pool would find a way to beg off. I wasn't far off the mark.
When the line of people who were claiming hardship was done, 30 people had been allowed to leave. Most were simple, no pay from employer, care provider for elderly parent (or children, that was about even, with four for one, and three for the other). One woman asked to be excused because she was getting maried around the predicted end date for the trial. The judge allowed as that wasn't a reason, but he figured she's be so distracted as to be a non-useful juror.
I got up, not to claim hardship, but to point out that, were I selected, and the trial to last past the longest date given (and the means of projecting the calendar seemed odd, as things went on) that I was going to be out of the country in late June, and the 22nd was the last date they could expect me. Our moving, and the other minor things which might be going on I left out. They aren't a hardship. The judge said that if we were still here on June 22nd, there were more problems than just my leaving.
And so the voir dire began. One quickly got an idea of what the case was about (breach of contract, but that's vague). We had the witness list, and I recognised some names. Right away that told me something, because we've only lived in this part of the world for a couple of years. I recognised the names because they were public officials of various stripes. The defendant is a local harbor district. The plaintiffs seemed to be alleging a number of losses from management, and maintanence of a pier.
Most people didn't want to be there, which the attorneys took for granted (the non-plussed look when a juror, late in the day on Friday said she wanted to be on the jury was priceless, in a sad sort of way). But most of them weren't willing to say they couldn't be fair. There were some who did. One guy said he knew too many people involved on both sides of the issue, and his discomfort with that would make it hard, almost impossible, to be objective. That one confused me. Since he knew people on both sides (not principals, mind you, but employees) he'd have to be unfair to both sides. Huh? He was excused.
There was the lawyer the judge smacked upside the head during his appeal to be let off, "I have a seminar I'm supposed to give in London and it would be a grave embarrassment to me to have to cancel it.."
To which the reply was, "Are you aware of some hardship here that I'm not, because I just don't see one."
He was juror number one.
Voir dire was tedious, in an enlightening sort of way. One got to see some of the quirks of the lead counsel. Plaintiff's lead was more affable, less stiff, and not working so hard. Defense lead seem more akward, trying too hard. Both of them were (as one might expect) fairly sharp. Plaintiff's counsel were both better dressed.
Some of the responses. I only saw two people who really worked at being let off the jury. One was excused (late Friday, when he'd thought he was pretty much safe from being called at all) because he said he couldn't be fair. His fairness was also odd. He doesn't believe in monetary damages. If someone fails to do something, then they have to fix it, but if the harm cost someone a lot of money, they just have to suck it up. Hah! I wonder how he'd feel if a contractor happened to screw-up his roof and he was charged a large fine by the state, had to live in a motel for a month while it was fixed and the contractor said he didn't owe him anything; after all he fixed the roof. He was the only challenge for cause, it was denied. As the pre-emptory lay with the defense he survived a round. Which was odd, because he'd also said he was pissed at the harbor District about something relating to his previous owning of a pleasure boat he used to fish out of.
There was one woman who had no problem being on the jury. She'd served on a criminal case and been the lone hold-out, leading to a hung jury. The judge blinked at that, but only a little, and she was able, in fair detail, to explain what had happened. If you ask me she'd have made a pretty good juror, she'd obviously paid attention to the trial (her doubt being based on a small piece of testimony about the various types of LSD, and some question about the State's case not addressing the issue), and she took the issues seriously.
She may have been wrong about how the law ought to be interpreted, she may have misheard the expert witness, but she was being attentive to what she saw as her duty, and she was paying attention. I think I'd have kept her, but she was a late removal.
Juror number 12 had hearing problems, from seasonal allergies. He looked to be excused, but he wanted to tough it out, and both sides were willing to let him. He sat through all of Thursday, and midmorning Friday said he wasn't hearing all the questions. The bailiff brought out a "listening device" (which seemed to be an ambient microphone) and he tried that, but it didn't really work, since it made everything louder. "It's very annoying, and now I hear every rustle of paper, and every creaking seat. I don't know if my neighbor here knows that her knees pop when she moves". He was thanked and released.
The only real excitement came with the juror who played poker with one of the witnesses (and one almost certain to be called). Much questioning of how much extra credibiltity he might give that man's testimony. It looked as though he was going to be empaneled, but we were late in the day and his questioning was held over to the morning.
We came back and the judge asked the panel if there was anything which they'd thought of in the night which would affect their performance. The poker player said yes. His wife worked for one of the defendants some 27-28 years ago. He didn't wan't to talk about it in open court. They retired to chambers (the judge, all counsel, the recorder and the juror). Five minutes later he comes out and sits down. A few minutes after that the rest come out, he's excused and the judge orders the recorder to seal the record of what was said in chambers until the court said to release them.
I wonder what it was all about.
A bit later was the curious bit. A juror was called. He rose, walked to his seat and sat down. It had been about an hour and the judge called a 10 minute recess, which was in keeping with habit. We were due for a break, and this would prevent the questioning from being broken up.
We came back, and everyone before the bar was leaving chambers, the jurors sat down and the new guy, having been asked no questions, was excused. Not stipulated out, just told to go his merry way.
And then there was the guy who refused to be a a juror. It wasn't that he didn't want to be on the panel. I think he did, but he was unable to accept the limits of doing the job. He'd been under the pier a lot, and recently (he kayaks). He is some sort of phsycist, with an engineering degree. He said he would do research, couldn't promise not to go out and look at things which were discussed in court and he wouldn't really accept expert witnesses at face value, but would weigh what they said against his understanding (which seems okay to me, experts are giving opinion, which can't be wieghed against other testimony, so gut reaction to credibilty {a piss poor method} and what one knows seem the only way to evaluate what they say) and he would research the topics (which doesn't seem ok to me, since the level of research one can perform is limited in scope, and without some expertise there's no good way to choose from the facts one does find).
As I listened to all of this (and he was getting all sorts of questions from both counsel and the bench) I realised why we place the silly sounding restrictions on jurors (no evidence outside the courtroom, and none they didn't all see at the same time). If they get to look at things on their own, they stop being an impartial decider, and move to being an advocate of some piece of evidence. All of a sudden one side has an advantage, and there's no way to see to it, anymore, that the field is level.
The pool is getting smaller, and it seems, at each calling of a name, that surely I can't be that low on the list. One guy spent all day going "whew" every time his name wasn't called. Then on Friday he'd decided it might be better than going to work and he was willing.
Now the alternates are being selected. I am less eager to be one of them, but still.... It gets down to the last one. Of the 80 people who started, 13 are in the box, seven are in the pool, and the rest have gone by the boards. A name is called. Counsel looks confused, papers are shuffled as the woman walks to the box.
As I am collecting my things, the second-chair for the defense turns and tells me I got lucky. I shrug. I'm disappointed. By now I was really interested in the case, and I know that I am more suited to being a juror than most. Oddly enough my job requires a lot of the things everyone wants. The ability to be dispassionate, to not make snap decisions, to wait until everything has been heard before deciding, to look at a narrow set of events, and for a narrow set of answers. Those are all job skills of the good interrogator.
Then he goes on to tell me, no I really got lucky, the clerk made an error reading the list. The paper shuffling was them trying to find her info, because they had mine ready to go. I was supposed to have been called.
And that pissed me off.
Because, in the course of this I realised why I want to be on juries, and what the amazing aspect of the system is. It isn't that we choose 12 random people, with no expertise to sit in on matters of life, death, money and the like. No.
It's that we decide to trust them to do this thing. At an abstract level asking strangers to settle one's fate is absurd.
I went to opening arguments (I was curious).
The planitiffs in this case are alleging that the Harbor District put one business out of businees, that decisions they made (and in bad faith) cost the other business a fair sum of money. They want four million dollars, and changes in the way the pier is run.
Twelve random people are being asked to listen to the cases, look at the facts presented; and the law as explained, and make a decision. No matter which way they decide, great things (at least for the principals) hang in the balance. One side sees the loss of millions of dollars, the other sees livelihoods; built over decades.
Both sides are willing to put this question to people who couldn't care less.
That's one hell of a thing to trust a stranger to do.