Thursday, December 08, 2005

Episode II: The Phantom Jury

Another day of jury duty, waiting to be called... the wheels of justice turn slowly apparently.

8:30am - I arrived and checked in, and took an obligatory seat in the jury assembly room. Today I got here plenty early, and got a nice table to work at over in the corner. Much easier than sitting with your laptop on your lap. It's decidedly more empty in here today, maybe removing those 40 folks from yesterday made a difference. As I count the number of people in the room I'm in... 37. There's probably slightly more in the other room, and a few more in the lobby. So yeah, I'd estimate at least 100 folks around here today waiting for their chance to serve (or more likely, sitting around hoping they're not called so they can go home for good at the end of the day).

9:15am - First announcement of the morning. 4 cases on the docket today with potential juries. Nothing as of yet, so more to come. I'll continue to sit here wasting time finding things to do online.

10:30am - Still nothing. We had an "official" jury break... but still no news. In one of the rooms they started a movie on the TVs, I guess it was good... I was already sitting in the "quiet" room and didn't feel like moving from my excellent seat. :)

11:15am - Finally some word. Of the 4 cases scheduled today, 3 of them have settled or otherwise been dismissed. That leaves only 1 jury remaining for the day, and we've got way too many people for that. So 50 people are selected to be excused with thanks for their service. My name is called, and I'm done.

And that was the story of my jury duty experience. I guess it wasn't a total waste of time... though it's hard not to think that when I spent two days doing nothing short of sitting around doing nothing. Oh well. At least I've served my time until next time.

1 comment:

bdleaf said...

Lucky you. I waited for a day, then was dismissed. The next day I got called for a jury. Trial finished that day, and was somewhat interesting, but I would have much rather not have done it all.