Text 10153, 58 rader
Skriven 2007-01-15 07:22:00 av Methuselah Jones (13573.babylon5)
     Kommentar till en text av rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Ärende: Re: Shades of "12 Angry Men (1957)"
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Carved in mystic runes upon the very living rock, the last words of 
<dachapp@worldnet.att.net> of rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated make
plain: 

> 
> Kay Shapero wrote:
>> In article <Xns98B7603A29BD3methuselahaltgeekorg@216.196.97.131>,
>> methuselah@altgeek.org says...
>>
>> > You could just jump up during voire dire and yell "Guilty! Guilty!
>> > Guilty!" That ought to take care of it. Then again, if LA's jury
>> > system is like ours, being eliminated in voir dire just means you
>> > go back into the pool until your 1-month term is up, or you get
>> > selected on a jury. 
>> >
>> In LA it's one day or one trial; if you're on a jury panel and
>> released before the end of the first day you have to go back to the
>> jury room and take your chances, but being on a panel past the first
>> day counts as trial service even if you don't make it onto the jury.
> 
> I was in that situation in LA a few years ago. I spent all day in the
> pool room. finally I was in a group in a courtroom. The jurors were
> questioned and let go one by one. I almost made it out, but was one of
> the last two people questioned. I really had thought I would make it
> without being picked for a jury when the lawyers decided they would
> need a third alternate. I had to sit in on a two-week traffic case.
> First one juror was let go, I became second alternate. then nine days
> in another juror was let go. i became first alternate. Finally the
> jury went to deliberate. I had to show up anyway, just in case. I
> wasn't allowed to deliberate, but had to be ready to go in if they let
> another go. Torture. The jury came out after two days of deliberation
> and read the verdict. I then got to go home. Not fun, not fun... 

With our system, you're notified that you have a one-month term of jury 
duty. During that time, you have to be available, but you may or may not 
be called. If you're called, you go and wait in the pool room, where 
people are selected at random to form prospective juries. 20 or 30 people 
at a time are called, and go to the court room. From there, 14 are again 
selected at random and voir dire begins. Anyone rejected is replaced from 
the sub-pool there in the court room. Once 14 jurors (12 regular, two 
alternates) have been selected, the rest return to the larger pool. At 
the end of the trial, the alternates are eliminated by random drawing, 
and the rest go to deliberate. Once you've served on a jury, your term is 
done.

I served on the jury in a Felonious Assault case in October '05. I found 
the whole thing quite interesting and even enjoyable. But then, I got 
selected on my second day there, so I didn't have to do a lot of waiting 
around. Plus, I was Juror #1, so I ended up being Foreman, and got to 
read the verdict (woo hoo!) It was pretty cool seeing the whole thing 
from the inside, and seeing how different it was from what you see in 
movies and TV.

-- 
Methuselah
I'm not cheap, but I am on special this week
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