Just finished up a week long trial. How 12 random people come together and "bond" in their common goal to provide justice to the victims in a crime/s is one of the most unique experiences an American can have, imo. My trial had everything from video and DNA evidence, to highly qualified blind expert testimony that basically put the final nail in the coffin for the prosecution's case in chief. The DNA evidence, as testified by the crime bureau agent was the "smoking gun" that made our task much easier. The a-hole defendant was basically f'd early on although we could not say that until the case was turned over to the jury to deliberate.

We had a couple hold outs in our deliberations but only the upmost respect for those folks as we had to discuss the actual law and achieve the "beyond reasonable doubt" standard. Defense counsel had an impossible task but again, upmost respect for their role in the process.

Jury selection and voir dire was it's own unique experience that preceeded the week's events.

It's been an education to say the least-difficult or impossible to attain watching "lawtube".

Drug facilitated sexual abuse ( DFSA) by a person in a position of trust. The 15 year old daughter, who's father was out of town for labor day weekend (2022), was left with a trusted acquaintance of several years, who lived in their basement, got her drunk, showed her porn, and while basically passed out, raped her. Sentencing in Feb., But I'm imagining this 41 year old piece of shit will be a very old man before he has anything resembling freedom. I'm so glad we could provide justice for her and her family.

On a side note, if you watch Dateline tonight (12/8), the same judge and prosecutor will be featured in an unrelated case (The Last Weekend).

I served on what initially appeared to be a simple DUI case. The case lasted 3.5-days, turns out this case, actually had instances of indecent exposure to several women at a park parking lot over a multi-day period, along with alcohol and vehicle. The jury deliberation lasted about 2-3 hrs, and I was pleasantly surprised at how serious everyone took to their roles and everyone was deferential to each others points of view. There was a few that attempted to be salty about being on the case but, once discussions started, everyone participated and was being fair. The experience helped restore my faith in our court and justice system.

I had to report 3 weeks ago but I was struck or eliminated by the defendant's lawyer most likely. Didn't get selected to show up for the one this week and next time I have to see if I have to go in isn't until January.

Last time I went, they called groups of people randomly by number. I swear a hundred people left for voir dire, there were just two of us left, and they said we were done for the year. I’ve been called 6 times: 3 times I didn’t make it past the telephone check in and 3 times I at least made it to the courthouse, but not past the waiting room. Maybe next year.

I seem to catch the fun ones. First was a child molesting case, not fun. The second was a gang murder. That one was a scary. The Gang members, dressed in their symbolic garb, rode the elevator along with the jury members. Not a very comfortable situation. There was not a spoken word, just their body language. I was the foreman in both trials.

I was on a felony criminal jury not long ago. Pretty cut & dry case, deliberations only took us about 1/2 hour to get to unanimous.
Defense had opted for jury sentencing, but I guess the state made a deal prior to us coming back to deliberate punishment.

First time in 5 summons I've gotten on the jury.
Usually, affiliation with family in LE gets me cut.
But therefore multiple retired officers, an FBI agent & active SO personnel in the jury pool.

I've been summoned three times and only got on a jury once. Then they told us "Never mind, go home" because at the last minute the defendant opted for a bench trial. I received a 4th summons in the mail a few months ago, but I'd moved out of state a year ago so I wasn't actually eligible.

I served on a jury for assault with a deadly weapon. The trial lasted about 3 days. College kid broke up with his girlfriend. Girlfriend immediately started hanging out with some other guys. Ex-boyfriend got jealous and confronted them in their dorm room. Girl had to hide in the closet. Guy took ex-boyfriend outside to talk with him. Ex pulls a knife and ex gets cut in the ensuing scrum. He testified that he only pulled the knife in self defense.

I thought deliberations shouldn't take long; we'll convict him of assault with a deadly weapon and get on with our lives. Once deliberations started I was amazed at how some of the jurors saw the case. I remember thinking to myself, "Did we just watch the same trial?" It was mainly a group of older ladies that didn't want to convict for assault with deadly weapon.

We ended up convicting him of assault rather than assault with a deadly weapon.

Fed trial about five years ago. Three days over stupid stuff. I already knew but the real lesson was don’t mess around on fed land.

quote:

Originally posted by Skull Leader:
I served on a jury for assault with a deadly weapon.

Ours had a deadly weapon enhancement, also unanimous.

quote:

Originally posted by Skull Leader:I remember thinking to myself, "Did we just watch the same trial?" It was mainly a group of older ladies that didn't want to convict for assault with deadly weapon.

One of the jurors we had was a substitute teacher, she was very hesitant to find the defendant guilty as she kept returning to the idea of, 'adding more brown people to jail' and 'this is probably not his first charge'....issues not germane or pertinent in the role of a juror.
A couple of the other female jurors had to remind her the seriousness of public exposure, his active pursuit of a number of women while fully exposed, along with the high BAC he had.

Yep, we were lucky to have a group that could look at the case 'in a vacuum' as presented.

I have been called for jury duty only once in my life (63 years old now), and was dismissed on the very first day. I was actually looking forward to it, but was struck based on something I said which I never figured out. Oh well...

I have been called twice for jury duty in 2023 - once for the feds and once for the state. I was the 12th juror picked for state and I was in back row for feds so the jury was empaneled before it got to me.

The state case is actually the only time I have served on a jury and it was for family court. It was a custody battle between two narcissists who couldn't co-parent and it was roughly their 10th time in court in 10 years.

One of the "parents" actually made the child testify on their 15th birthday and had their low budget attorney ask, "Which parent do you want to live with?" The kid cried their eyes out on the witness stand in front of a room full of strangers. Quite a few moist eyes in the jury box too.

Both parents were shitty human beings and it came down to the least objectionable parent (i.e. too bad there wasn't a 3rd option). After the trial the judge came into the jury room, spoke with us a few minutes, and quipped "I wouldn't let either one of them babysit my kids."

Jury duty 3 times. The one time I got picked we were all sitting in the anti-room when we heard yelling and screaming and lots of ebonically enhanced f-bombs regarding someone's mother (assuming the trial judge) coming from inside the courtroom. Moments later the bailiff came into the anti-room and excused us all with the thanks of the court, and said the matter had been plead out.

I love it when the defense lawyers see the verdict written on the wall before the trial.

Donated the $8.

Once jury seating begins, I am immediately booted out. Being an ex-cop is the cause. Fortunately, the court clerk sends out a questionnaire that asks about qualifications and that keeps me from being selected.

I have been on several juries, much to my surprise. The most fun was a grand jury. The prosecutor would present a short summary of the charges and evidence. We would discuss and indict or not. The funniest case was the Foot Prince, as I later heard him called. A man reported to the cops his garage had been broken into, and expensive tools taken. Responding officers followed the thief's foot prints to his garage, where they saw the tools through the garage window. It was hard not to laugh as the defendant sat there.

I'm retired so I would have no problem serving . My son is a Deputy so there's no chance of them picking me to serve.

I got called once for a civil case (contract dispute on a construction project). I thought I would get booted because I was an atty. But, neither side had an issue with that. We had a 3-week trial and took less than an hour to find for the defendant.

A couple of years ago, I witnessed a bad car accident where an impaired driver blew a red light, t-boned a car that had started to turn, killing a little boy and seriously injuring his brother.

I was pretty freaked out and posted about it here to get it off my mind. Several folks responded, telling me to write a statement of what I saw and let the local police know I was a witness, which I did.

A year later, I got subpoenaed to testify at the driver's trial for vehicular manslaughter. The day before I was to appear, the prosecutor called me to see if I was ready to testify and if I still stood by my statement. I told him that, not only did I stand by every word of my statement, but that not a day went by that I did not think about that little boy who had his life snuffed out because of that driver.

Later that day the prosecutor called me again to let me know that the trial was over. He had called the driver's atty to let him know what I'd said and the driver decided to plead guilty (in exchange for a lighter sentence) rather than have me testify.

^ thank you for posting. I posted also to help process my experience for the week. On the one hand, my faith in the process, although LE and the detective could have been better in their investigations, it did not significantly affect the case and restored some faith in our justice system. However, on the the other hand, our current society has introduced so many more perils for children and is more difficult to dismiss that.

Understanding that the far majority of cases never make it to trial, your impact and influence is direct evidence of that, and is as important if not more than serving on a jury. I'm still going to need time until this has been filed away, as satisfying as the final result was. Thanks again.