The Legal List
After two long days sitting, waiting in the Court House, for the trial I was supposed to hear, the Prosecution and Defense plead the charges out, so I never got to hear one piece of testimony or render a decision.
At the end of the day today the Judge came in and thanked us for our service. I mean, we were there, and would have done our job if we had been needed. Then he spoke to us for a bit and answered all our questions, or at least the ones that he could.
- If you get a Jury Summons…go. You can be held in contempt and put in jail if you blow it off.
- Not everyone who gets a summons actually serves on a Jury.
- You can even be sitting in the Jury Box during the selection process and have a Lawyer throw you off during Voir dire.
- There is a lot of sitting around when you are on Jury Duty.
- If you are lucky, the people on the panel with you will get along with you and the others.
- I have to say, the Court House Staff, Deputies and Sheriffs were all so nice. They did the best that they could to keep us happy and informed. One Deputy joked that he was our Deputy and would take a bullet for us! lol!
- I’d intended to catch up on my reading, but these were really good people on the Jury Panel, and in the end, we shared stories about our lives, New Hampshire and told jokes and funny stories.
- The weather was pouring rain one minute (during the drive) and then bright, sunny, and hot the next.
- The holding area for us was in a room where the air conditioner was broken!
- I kept drinking cold water…
- You guessed it. I had to keep asking to go to the ladies room. How embarrassing.
- One more trial next week, then I hope I am done. I could still be called on June 4th for another Jury or two.
- Then after this, I am free for three years! Yay!
having just been called for the OCt-Dec 2011 jury group, I feel for you – except I never had to go to a trial … I did get paid $6 twice for my gas to travel to/from the courthouse for the 2 meetings that I did have to attend!!! 🙂
This is very interesting to me, because we don´t have this in our country. I think it´s great though. Every citizen has the right to participate. Cool!
Great! It doesn’t work the same way here. We go for one day and if we don’t get picked we are done. I was hoping to get picked, I’d like to sit on a jury if it wasn’t anything too bad. I think it would be interesting. I don’t like sitting around though. Love YOU, Mel
in Belgium a jury is only requested when it comes to murder or kidnapping. 12 people between 30 and 60 are chosen amongst the population. It never happened to me because I am not Belgian. Are you in a murder case ?