Jury Duty
Yesterday I enjoyed doing my part of our justice system by trying to get out of actually being part of the jury that would decide a man’s fate. I had been summoned to a civil court, and arrived slightly early. Just enough time to get a seat that I would own instead of sitting in between people and feel weird about it. The blonde woman who was running the show, yes it was a show, was speaking what I can only assume is her normal speech to jurors. She spoke with a repetitive up and down motioning of her head, if left to watch her any longer than I did I probably would have become quite nauseous. In between her deadening speeches she would make a phone call and laugh far too loudly and long. The only other person that I know who made such a laugh was an original staff writer of SNL, and her laugh was always assumed caused from lots of cocaine usage. Thankfully this blonde courthouse clerk did not share the same style of women’s breast support that the writer had, I wouldn’t have wanted to see her boobies dangling without support, nope not her.
The civil court only had one case that needed 12 or so jurors, but criminal court needed 30 jurors. The manic blonde clerk asked for volunteers, with the ploy of the courthouse being brand new, every, even the bathrooms. What an offer! Surprisingly three people got up, one of them was the creepy eating disorderly thin woman who sat next to me, and worked as a publicist. She had worn a backless, sleeveless dress; I swear if her spine and arms had eyes they were staring at me. For this, I was glad that she was leaving my sights. That left 27 other juror spots for criminal court. I ended up being plucked up to go for the walk over to the criminal courts. Not being soundly familiar with the courthouse area, I wasn’t fully sure where I was exactly walking, but thankfully I had that spine that stood out on the street that I followed to the new 25 story State courthouse. Immediately after passing through the security checkpoint and having to remove my belt to do so, I went for the nearest bathroom. Yes, it was new, but I don’t see how it lived up to the touting that the blonde clerk made it to be. In fact, whoever ordered the sinks would have been sent to the eastern most section of Siberia had it been built in Soviet Era Moscow. They have giant sink basins, with the smallest of sink heads that barely enter the sink basin, so you have to touch the dirty sink in order the rinse with water. Purel came in handy. The waiting room for jurors was huge, it had capacity to fit about 680 people according to fire safety signs, and it had a dozen or so 50-inch plasma screen TVs. This would have been great if they had something good on, instead of MSNBC coverage of death and carnage in India.
So, my name was called in for a jury selection. I went up to the 19th floor, to a crystal clean floor, and sat in a pew that had the same look of my mothers kitchen table. The judge was a pleasant fellow overall, and was much better in attempting to make it not feel like surgery compared to the judge I had 5 years ago. When asked if there was an emergency that would not allow my presence at a trial for a week I got up, explained my case, and was shot down and told, “that’s not excusableâ€. The prosecutor was way too full of smiles; every time she stood up she had on a full toothed grin with dimples. The defense attorney was a boorish man who lacked even half a smile, and further lacked good posture. The defendant was a foreign man who did not speak English, and had a court appointed interpreter on his left hand side. I assume that the defense counsel was court appointed too. I felt bad for the man on trial based on what CXB said of his court appointed attorney, which was that the attorney didn’t return his calls, or go over what he (CXB) should be done in court prior to actually being in there. The clerk next to the judge called 16 names to go sit in the jury box, thankfully I wasn’t called. I was still forced to watch the proceedings.
The proceedings when something like this, with the alleged crime itself being a mystery. In the beginning the judge said that a woman alleged that the man touched her inappropriately at knifepoint inside Prospect Park. The judge asked everyone personal questions that might pertain to giving an unfair judgment prior to the facts of the case. Both the prosecutor and defense attorneys asked similar questions over and over and over in different ways. The prosecutor referred to the alleged crime as a sexual assault, which the defense attorney objected to, the judge had informed the jury that it wasn’t sexual assault. No one officially said what the man was really charged with, and people in the jury box even said, no one has said what crimes this man is charged with specifically. From what I gathered and assumed from the lines of questions was that the man and woman went on a few dates, they were out on a date in Prospect Park, at some point a knife was allegedly pulled out, either before or after he allegedly touched her breast, and that there were no witnesses to this occurring. Based on my basic assumption the case doesn’t seem to have good legs to stand on, but I don’t know for sure, since I didn’t actually see the evidence and no one was even informed what the man is charged with.
If he did do that entire event, I’m not sure why? If he did pull a knife and touched a breast, he obviously wasn’t waiting in respect of the woman and waiting for her to feel comfortable enough to allow him the touch her. I mean they were out on a bunch of dates together already. Why didn’t hadn’t he leaned in and tried to kiss her yet, why hadn’t she leaned in for a kiss, and why hadn’t they made out to the point that they felt each other up yet? I’m not saying that he didn’t do it, I’m just finding it odd that they apparently didn’t already get to second base after a few dates, that’s all.
So, of the original 16, five people were actually placed on the jury, and then 16 more people had to get called up to the jury box. I was one of the unfortunate ones to be called. Just as I sat down the prosecutor asked to approach the bench. The prosecutor, defense attorney, and judge were talking about me. The prosecutor wanted to have me excused from the case so I could go to college next week. The judge played dumb, and had no memory of speaking with me for five minutes only three hours earlier. I was called to the bench, and the judge asked if I had college next week, and I answered yes, he said, “you’re excused from the case, not from jury dutyâ€. I went back down to the jury pool room, and was then released from jury duty all together. I don’t have to go back for six years!
I actually wouldn’t mind sitting on a jury. I think it would be fun, and I would most likely come away from it feeling good, in that I either convicted a guilty man, or set a man free for being actually innocent, or there not being evidence that they did a crime. I just didn’t want to sit on this one, due to my starting college next week. I figured I had waited eight years to continue with conventional education, if I got delayed again, it might have continued the delay another eight years.