@FatLynn: I had gotten summonses for jury duty 3 YEARS after I moved out of the STATE. DL changed over, voter reg changed over, etc. I knew because the summons went to a relative's house at my old address. 4 summons over 3 years. Each sent back with a note- "Moved out of state, not available." After number 4 showed up, I called them to change their database, since they couldn't take a hint.

I always wondered about that, though. What if they summons a person who moves out of state, and never gets the notice(s)? Some states can put a warrant out on said person. What happens if this person comes back to that state in the future for a visit and gets pulled over?

(Though I hope they don't call me anytime soon; I'm a nursing mom and I don't know if they'll let you out of it to nurse your kid.)

She's not even really a helicopter mom. She's just ... clueless and afraid of everything. SHE is very shy and so avoids interacting with people unless she can't avoid it, so most of this crap about him getting sick is so SHE doesn't have to leave the house ever. And then on top of that, she wasn't really willing to change her lifestyle even though she became a stay-at-home mom. And on top of THAT, they can't stand to listen to him fuss, cry, or complain, so there has never been even the tiniest bit of discipline. Remind me in the Friday thread and I'll share some of the craziest crazy I've observed.

If your state has a poor merge process for those records, or if you have a different name in different places ("John Q. Public" on your license but "John Quincy Public" on your voters card), that's the most typical reason for being called "too often" and most states can do a manual merge to get your identities together and only call you the right amount.

@Yurei: Its a waste of an unemployed persons time to go make money?

Unless he is out there 8 hours a day hitting the payvement looking for a job...I doubt it was a waste of his time. It may not have been profitable, but you were saving somone else the pain of skipping work.

@Loias: I agree. I think the unemployment line should be the first stop of calling jurors.

But im guessing in doing so, the vast majority of people unemployed would be disqualifed from being a juror for the same reasons they cant get jobs.

But we dont know when they will come.

The calculations were thrown off by initial reports of 11 invites being available. I got only 8 to hand out. Which crimped some off. Because otherwise i had 5 meatspace friends on the list, and 3 of them got wave around the same time as i did. Could have covered good ground with the other 3.

BUT - they will also apparently pull a crappy thing where they'll walk you to a different court house in the middle of the day if you have a car. This of course only happens on your first day, before you've been seated on a jury, and before you get mileage - supposedly if you are on a bus, they are kind enough to not make you go.

LOL we had a saying back in the day... Rules Lawyers

The second time, the defense counsel was a personal friend who used a peremptory to keep me off his jury. The charge was arson and, if proved, I would have voted for the death penalty. (Only joking, no one was in the house.)

@Ronin-Democrat: +1 Zing.

(They actually did finally go see a behavioral therapist, and he told them EXACTLY WHAT I'VE BEEN TELLING THEM FOR YEARS which comes from a) common sense and b) a loose familiarity with human children.)

I called the number and explained that I had moved out over 1.5 years ago. That I had changed both my drivers license and my voter registration. She said they used voter registration information. I said, well I voted last year in the primary and general election at my new address. In other words my voter registration was up to date. She tried to argue with me. I quickly just told her that I would LOVE to serve on a jury and can we re-schedule. She said yes. We scheduled for December this year. I was thrilled, I have an employer that pays me while serving... Then I just got a new job offer. I start 12/1. I would be serving 2 weeks after starting a new job. I called, and they were kind enough to postpone it to April, long after my 90 day window before I can take any time off.

I have never been summoned until now, and I'm 41 have lived almost my entire life in this county.

Oh, and we get paid a whopping $10 a day.. with free parking. But I don't know about WIFI yet... ;)

@robodomo: Actually, I bet he's posting from has laptop with free wifi...

I served on a jury for a aggravated sexual assault case back in my college days during the summer. It lasted about a week and I enjoyed the experience. I found the whole experience very enlightening, and I can say that I am responsible for putting a serial rapist away for life. The fascinating part came after we were done and the prosecutor was able to disclose a lot of information that was excluded. By the way, this was in Texas where the defendant gets the option of the jury determining sentencing.

cool thank you!

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!): They don't call them "rules lawyers" in D&D for nothing.

@RecordStoreToughGuy_IsBeing(pur)SuedByAMonster: That must have been on a big case questionaire, I've never seen a normal voir dire include asking people their hobbies. Most of the time its occupation, occupation of spouse and adult children living at home, do you know anyone involved in the case, and if ever been a victim of X (where X equals the incident at issue in the trial). After those general questions, sometimes there's more specific questions, but not usually about hobbies (unless that happens to be the issue in the case).

I say this because I've been on several juries, plus I've seen many trials (and voir dires) and never seen that question before.

@DangerMouth: What?? You're a D&D player and you can't fudge a character sheet? What kind of geek are you? :)

Where can I sign up for this again?

The trial I served on was awesome. It all depends on how nice the judge is. At this trial, one lawyer was objecting after every other question and the judge finally took a huge bag of Hersheys Miniatures out from under his bench and starting throwing handfuls of them into the courtroom after each objection and whoever caught them could eat them. At one point he also squirted a water pistol at the defendant. OK, I'm just kidding about all this but you never know, yours could be the first jury trial where they do this. :)

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!):

A bunch of lawyers playing D&D... that makes me cringe.

@Scuba Steve: I was called for jury duty in a small town, and when there weren't enough jurors who showed up for jury duty, the judge called in a police officer, gave him the list of names and addresses, and told him to "go out and round 'em up". About an hour later, the officer came back with 5 or 6 sheepish looking people. (Evidently you CAN get arrested for not showing up for jury duty.)

I really wanted to get picked, because I was unemployed at the time and I always wanted to be on a jury. But the first question was "have you ever been the victim of a crime" and my apartment had been broken into the week before. They dismissed me in about 5 seconds.

@wgrune: When I've been called, the lawyers usually tell you the expected length of a case. And if being on such a long case would be a hardship. If so, then you are dismissed and sent back to the pool. Of course, the 3-day civil case could be an aberration and you end up on a 2-week case; in that event, well, you're probably stuck.

That's exactly what litigators do -- work with a limited set of facts within the construct of court rules to attempt to defeat someone else doing exactly the same thing.

Baltimore County pays $15 a day, plus they validate parking, so you don't pay for it.

And they have free wifi in the waiting room, but not nearly enough power outlets. And the wi-fi was pretty locked down - I couldn't rdc or run citrix apps.

The questions to the jury are typically "Does X violate law Y?" or "Did Company Z do enough of X to qualify as violation of law Y?" or "Did X happen or not happen?" It's fairly rare that jurors need to understand the technicalities; I worked on a very technical patent lawsuit, but the dispute wasn't actually about the technical aspects (although the lawyers had to have a pretty good grip on those). The dispute was about whether one company had poached the info from the other company, which required very little knowledge of the subject and a lot of looking at e-mails to decide whether they were saying, "Hey, let's steal this patent!"

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!): Well, if that's how they do it, I should be getting tons of calls. We have lots of crime in the DC area.

If there's more than one venue within your jurisdiction and one's easier, it's definitely worth trying to request the one with better accessibility. I did that back when I lived in Chicago with no problem.

@Ayarkay: I've heard of that, but I was wondering if there were still states where any money earned means no unemployment for the week. Here in Mass. we are lucky -- no deductions from UI until you earn 20% of your weekly payment (max of over $600 here, so you could work some hours and still get full UI).

Since I moved into my current home, I volunteered to serve again, but was rejected because I don't speak Spanish. Bummer.

@acvicari: Because they make more money working. And its hard to arrest someone for failing to show up for jury duty.

@utensil42: One answer to serve all purposes.

@FatLynn: Kinda like the military.

@azntg: I could see that. I'm an IT professional, and jurors (and most judges) have a really difficult time understanding the technical details of a case. I'm thinking of the recent music pirating trials where even the judges had difficulties understanding IP addresses, etc.

There are honest people out there, but with varying shades. All you need is one bad thing to spoil it for the rest.

For example, in that malpractice case with the jury being composed nearly exclusively of those with medical backgrounds, there's a very good chance of conflict of interest.

See, even with the jurors not knowing the defendant/plaintiff personally, those with medical backgrounds are also equally likely to get hit with malpractice suits. I can easily see the jury showing sympathy and fear of retribution (with or without a trial) and erring to the side of acquittal, even if it actually turns out to be a legitimate case of malpractice.

Anyway, she was calling me FRANTIC to help her get out of jury duty because they refused her "mother of a very young child" exemption by pointing out he was five, there was plenty of paid care available, he had two parents, and he should have already been in school but they had opted to homeschool because he was too special for school. I pointed out that two days in the local camp-style daycare would be a hoot for him, and she freaked out, insisting other kids would get her kid sick (in the middle of summer, before swine flu), they might tease him, he might get hurt and she wouldn't be there, some of these places hire child molesters ....

Anyway, I told her I wasn't going to help her get out of jury duty. She was pretty pissed. She started floating the lies she was going to use in court to appear biased, and got even more upset when I told her some of the local judges will hold people in contempt of court and have them held in jail if they try that crap.

But she was just too special to serve on a jury!

@SG-Cleve:

I can see that for a majority of cases where the entire case is wrapped up in a matter of days.

What if you get picked to sit on a capital murder trial that could last 6 months or more?

@SkokieGuy: I agree completely. Being an oil and gas accountant, I would have *loved* to be on the jury on any one of the Enron trials, and I think I would have understood a lot better than a layperson on what accounting shenanigans were being alleged. But they would have struck me before I could say "oil".

@utensil42: Exactly and all the more reason it should happen.

@SkokieGuy:

I totally agree but think juries should be comprised of retred judges. They would be less likely to fall for the tricks of sleazy lawyers and wowed by forensic evidence that is possibly less than scientific.

@Span_Wolf: We get it, you're on a laptop with free wifi. You can reply to multiple people, and everyone can see your comments, so there's no need to say the same thing three times.

I haven't been called in five years because the county I live in now just doesn't have that many jury trials.

When I was in Cook County, though, I got called every two years, like clockwork.

I find, however, that lawyers can be shockingly superstitious -- baseball superstitious -- about jury selection. His tie! His tie says he'll support the defendant! All the research in the world doesn't shake these convictions. :)

Not necessarily; the Illinois Labor Relations Board here decides workers comp claims and they find in favor of the claimant something like 99% of the time. They're "professionals" but they have a particular bias.

Doctors and other medical professionals can be problematic on malpractice juries because almost every doctor has been sued at least once, it's extraordinarily stressful, and their gut instinct is to side with the doctor on the grounds he's also being "persecuted."

Suppose it comes out in the trial that the defendant is someone who just layed off workers from their company?

MG MCHL MR NDS T MK WLDLY NFR FLM ABT THS.

I was a research assistant on the Arizona Jury Project, so I know a metric assload about juries and jury selection.

Here they're pretty good about saying "if you can't now, when can you?" and calling you when you've been able to work the time. I think that's a win-win, frankly, and I think more jurisdictions should do that.

@nbs2: With his mind, obviously.

No, you can not volunteer to serve on a Jury.

I alreay petitioned the state. Sorry, no go.

The State is worried that somebody might volunteer to serve in hopes of being called for a specific case.

I have served on jury duty several times. The new jurors arrive Monday morning at the county courthouse in a sour mood complaining about being forced to give up a week of their time.

By the end of the week pretty much everyone who was picked to serve on a jury says it was a worthwhile experience and are glad they did it.

@ponycyndi:

That is the case here,too! I have always wanted to do jury duty - just shoot me - but my involvement with volunteering to help juvenile defendants with community as a Teen Court educator and the fact that I love to argue, am very opinionated, and also applying to PhD positions in political science and public policy as well as getting a Poli Sci BA in May limits me, according to my friend who is a judge. As a prosecutor, she would probably have liked me, but not as a defense attorney she stated.

My Dad always gets picked and he usually has auditors or something big going on at work. The last time he had to go to court just to explain why the IRS wouldn't let him off work (he would have relished it I am sure! Who likes auditors?!) and it cost him $10.00 or something rediculous to park his car and he didn't get reimbursed. I think it pays $15.00 a day and no reimbursement and NO public transit to district court. That wouldn't even begin to pay for his food, either.

Maybe they pull from the list of people who don't vote regularly. Who knows.

I'm curious -- are there states where accepting even the small payout for jury duty would disqualify you from unemployment payments for that week? Some states let you earn a certain amount without making you requalify (and may or may not offset your earnings against your UI), but I had heard that some states won't let you earn anything... Having to go through the process (even if it's quick and simple) to requalify and then wait a couple of extra weeks for your check would be a painful way of doing your civic duty.

@Span_Wolf: On what? I can't think of a smartphone without a camera, cell phones are banned in every courhouse I can think of, and I wouldn't trust the jury room with my laptop.

@pecan 3.14159265: I haven't either. It makes me sad. The Missus has had one jury summons in the 4.5 years we've been married.

Lousy timing.

I am almost 40yos and never got summoned either. I have always wanted to do it, just never got the summons. I even have a job that makes it easy to go to jury duty.

Ugh, Jury Duty is boring. Most of the cases are not the exciting stuff you see on TV. I sat on a jury pool for two days on a misdemeanor case and the two attorneys were so junior that the judge had to coach them through the entire process. I was soooo happy when I was let go.

What was fun were the excuses people came up with to get out of it. A lady who spoke perfect English and was a human resources rep said she only understoon 50% English (she was a Philipino-American). The judge made her repeat it 5 times then excused her. 10 people used that excuse in the same day. Hilarious.

I fully support this. One: unemployed people get a small boon. Two: employed person then become less likely to have to serve on a jury and thus no longer have to be bothered by their public service duties. It's a win-win!!

@ponycyndi: Here's the NYS petit juror handbook. We get $40 per day (there are exceptions, so read the "compensated" question). No transportation reimbursements, though. So, let's see, add the $40 to your income but it costs $4.50 here in NYC to get to/from the courthouse via the bus/subway.

[www.nyjuror.gov]

Why not just reason it out instead of jumping wildly to conclusions?

(Seeing that it was more than THREE YEARS after I changed the address on both my DL and voter registration, they really shouldn't have been summoning me there)

@RecordStoreToughGuy_IsBeing(pur)SuedByAMonster:

You never know what they want on juries. I informed both sides of an Assault trial that I was a "card-carrying member of the ACLU" expecting that it would get me excluded in the pre-emptive challenges but I still ended up getting selected and was made Foreman.

P.S. Despite my civil liberties inclinations, we still sent the Defendent away for 3-5 years.

What does it say about me if I've never been summoned? Nearly everyone I know has been summoned for jury duty, but I haven't. Mr. Pi hasn't either, but the important thing is that I haven't been summoned. I mean, I make really good cookies.

I so wish we had professional juries taken from experts (perhaps retired) in the appropriate field.

If it's a malpractice case, would scientists, doctors, nurses and those with a medical background be better qualified to evaluate the evidence, rather than average citizens?

It is supposed to be a jury of your peers, yet seldom is.

@acvicari: I'm guessing he means that the Streeters & professionals who are also unemployed are volunteering? If not, then your question is valid.

@ponycyndi: This is why jury trials usually come up with really stupid decisions. Only people left are the ones that couldnt figure out a good excuse to get out of doing jury duty.

Not the brightest crayons in the box. If jury duty actually paid well, then perhaps people wouldn't be going through so much trouble to dodge it.

Wall streeters and professionals are not allowed any kind of occupational reprieve or deferral when they get a jury duty summons, nor would they be able to demonstarte that their missing work (esp. at a large firm) would be any kind of hardship.

Why aren't they sitting on juries normally.

Around here, jury duty pays $6.50 a DAY, and parking downtown is minimum $5.

Unless the rules are different when you are unemployed, and suddenly they pay $40, I hardly think it's worth it, especially condsidering I'd be spending another $10 on gas just to get there.

Assuming that one is still looking for work, one needs to find a way to kill time while leaving oneself available for interviews and sudden hirings. If you volunteer for jury duty, I'm not sure the judge will be too keen on you saying, "Your honor, I've got a job interview tomorrow so I'm not going to be able to make it in for deliberations until 2:30ish."

And like the first comment said, it could be a needed change in the day.

@Ronin-Democrat: Worst part of extended unemployment. The at-home boredom led to significant weight gain.

But seriously, perhaps it's your policy of rolling 4d8 to determine guilt, and factoring in the charisma of the defendant.