you! out of the pool!

[solarbird]

…AND I am excused yet again from jury duty.

Which is fine. I mean, there are so very many reasons, many of which are fair cop (HA! COP! GET IT?!) and some of which frankly I think would make me a better juror if you give a fuck about justice, but they ask about that shit and unless I want to lie to a court (which I very fucking well do not, I’m more useful out of jail than in) I’m going to get DQed pretty quick anyway.

This time however it took two years of on-and-off-again jury bullshit – mostly thanks to COVID, et al – so that sucked.

Anyway I wish they would keep a database of this or something because it’s a waste of their time and mine and it fucks up my schedule for a week every time they come back to me and I have been kicked out of so many jury pools. At this point it just gives me anxiety because I feel like I should be trying to be on a jury? Even if I kinda don’t want to? But that would mean lying to the court and I don’t like jail so I really shouldn’t, and more importantly, I wish I would stop getting anxious about it because I’m not cheating by giving answers I know will boot me off a jury if those answers are true. Which they are.

I just wish they’d stop asking holy shit I wish they’d just stop.

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.

Comments

[canyonwalker]

When I was called for jury duty 10 years ago I sat in a courtroom for a whole day before being sent home. They didn't even bring me up to the jury box for voir dire. It seemed like there were 100 of us there for a jury of just 12.

I'm pretty sure I would've been dismissed if they had interviewed me. One of the questions they were asking prospective jurors ahead of me was something like, "If the police broke the rules in arresting the defendant, would that affect how you judge their testimony?" That sure sounded like coded speech for, "The cops did an improper stop/search/questioning/detention," and I was ready to say as much in response.

[solarbird]

The closest I got was a while ago, back when they were still doing the "you have to be here for two weeks and we try to find cases for you every day" thing. That was actually kinda fun. The closest I got was into the box and my butt had just about hit the seat when the prosecuting attorney bounced me.

(I already knew I was done because she'd previously asked the pool what our opinion of intoxicated people was and I said "unintentionally entertaining" because I meant it and the defence bench in particular thought that was hilarious - seriously, both defendant and attorney laughed like hyenas - and the prosecutor gave me the Eye of Death and I was like 'whelp, I'm out' and so I was. xD )

[melchar]

That is a wonderful answer! [about intoxicated people] Too bad the prosecutor had no sense of humor.

[solarbird]

She was 400% All Business, No Fun.

[dewline]

Understood.

[jessie_c]

What an amusing coincidence :)
I didn't escape from my jury duty, and just an hour ago we reached our verdict. It was an intriguing experience and I hope to never have to do that again.

[solarbird]

Never having to do that again sounds good to me.

[jessie_c]

Our selection process seems to differ from yours in that the Crown and Defence didn't ask any questions, and the Justice was only interested in hearing from us the reasons why we might think we couldn't serve. The case included an accusation of sexual assault, so one woman volunteered that she had served with a rape crisis centre and they had to send everyone else out of the Court while they discussed whether it was fair to excuse her or not. In the end they decided that it wouldn't be an issue and she ended up on the jury. Other people had language issues, child support issues and the like. By the time my number was drawn I had no reason not to serve so I was immediately sworn in and that was that.

[solarbird]

oh jeez yeah we have two rounds of questionnaire before we even get to the point where they're asking us stuff directly and I got bumped out on round two of that again.

[jenk]

I brought up accessibility issues, since I currently can't walk more than a block or so without having to sit down and catch my breath. I do have a mobility scooter. This means I need to park (ha!) a minivan (hee!) and unload the scooter, and of course I need things like ramps. Plus this was when we had snow.

I was pleased to discover the court can arrange for accessible parking in a garage that connects through tunnels to the county courthouse. But, I was an alternate and not needed.