Jury Duty

On Thursday, February 18, I reported for jury duty. The only other time I've been called before was in Abilene, where I was dismissed after an hour. Not this time. Not only did I have to spend the entire day, I was there for the next SIX days. I was.... (Law & Order bum bum) Juror #2.

Now that the trial is over and the verdict has been delivered, I am free to discuss the case, the details, my opinions, etc. We were told up front that it was a domestic violence case-- the defendent was a man, the victim was his domestic partner. All of the jurors had a basic feeling where this would go. But after a week of witnesses and testimonies, we all agreed there was not enough evidence to convict this man. Did he do it? We all think so. Was there evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that he did it and it wasn't self-defense? No. So we found him not guilty. The really cool part was that there was a former cop on our jury. And he even agreed that the police had done a very poor job of collecting evidence in this case. Basically these two people are both very violent and cocaine users. A dangerous combination. I hope they will stay far away from each other now-- but that is doubtful.

I found the whole process very interesting and enjoyed getting to know my fellow jurors. If you like people-watching, a court house is a great place for that. In my juror pool alone, there were some very strange people who had some crazy thoughts and prejudices. At first I had a bad attitude about serving. But then I thought that if I were on trial, I would want intelligent, fair, open-minded jurors contemplating on my behalf. Over all I had a great 7 days on jury duty. And now I'm very happy to be back at work. :)