May 19, 2005

Comments (18)

1. no one in particular on 20 May 2005

   I got called once for this big civil trial. I guess like 600 people were called, of which about 150 showed up. It was some big deal that was supposed to take like three weeks or something, which is why they called so many people.

   They showed some lame video about the importance of juries or something.

   Then they said they were going to randomly call people up in groups of 24 until they found their pool of 12 people (9 plus 3 alternates, I think it was...) So they started calling names from 'A' and continuing down in alphabetical order. Many people seemed very annoyed that it wasn't actually random, and so they didn't get a chance to be called. It turned out they found their 12 people out of those first 24.

   There was this one guy in particular who was throwing a fit and talking to the judge about how it wasn't fair that he didn't get an opportunity to serve his civic duty because the names were alphabetical. Someone told me this guy was "Ron Pederman" or something, the weatherman for KOIN 6 news (I never watch the TV news so I had no idea who he was). This was later confirmed by a friend who said that Ron Pederman wasn't on the news that morning because they said he had jury duty.

   It seemed like a bizarre argument. I guess he hated his job. I was glad to be out of there.

2. Noah Brimhall on 20 May 2005

   I was called for jury duty earlier this year and it was a pretty good experience. If you have a laptop, bring it. They have wireless access and some ethernet jacks in the main jury room. Also, expect to be there at least the full day. They like to have a lot of people to pick from, so even if you get dismissed from one trial, you may be picked for another.

   I went into the process thinking I really wanted to serve on a Jury, but after hearing some of the details of the criminal case I was being evaluated for I changed my mind. I didn't get picked in the end, which was a relief. I would still like to serve on a minor criminal or civil jury.

3. Bill McDonald on 20 May 2005

   
   Since you use the royal "we" are you going to have more than one vote on the jury? You could be like Juror #3 AND Juror #4.
   Bill McDonald

4. JVK on 20 May 2005

   I was told to show up and wait in the jury queue. Over the next five hours, I started reading, and finished "Beowulf". Then they told me to go home.

   The end.

5. lisa on 20 May 2005

   Here's another kind of jury experience:

   A few years ago I was a reporter in NE P-land covering the trial of a 70-year-old African American grandmother, a Christian minister, who had been dragged from her van in a "compliance hold" by a Portland police officer and handcuffed as she lay unconscious on the sidewalk. The officer said he stopped her for failure to signal, and that during the stop, she became noncompliant.

   According to the the woman, a retired Loaves and Fishes center director on her way home from volunteering with Meals on Wheels, she had simply refused to produce her driver's license until the officer told her why he stopped her. The officer, half her age, claimed that he thought she might try to flee the scene in her van, and that’s why he had to do the neck-lock-drag thing. Picture it: Big White cop, little Black grandma from Meals on Wheels. She ended up in the ER after being released by the cops because she thought she was having a heart attack.

   The woman sued the cops, claiming a violation of her civil rights (aside from the obvious pain and indignity, this incident left her with her first and only arrest record).

   To make a long story sickening, the all-white jury unanimously sided with the buff, young cop (who was promoted soon afterward). I decided I had to interview the jurors. I loitered in the hallway of the Justice Center until the jurors, as a group, emerged from the courtroom and entered the elevator. I popped in right before the doors closed. I identified myself and essentially asked the jurors: What the hell just happened?

   The jurors, who spanned gender and age but not race, guffawed. They seemed incredulous that I would even ask. She deserved everything she got for the way she treated him, one white-haired woman said. He didn't do anything wrong, another woman said. I said: Do you believe anything like that could happen to you? Of course not, another white-haired woman said, I’ve never done anything to get pulled over by the police. They were smug and satisfied with their decision. (B!X -- there’s a local stereotype that says all Portland juries are made up of “Little Old Ladies from Sellwood,” and this jury had more than its share, and beefcake-loving,fellow-old-lady-bashing ones at that, it might be argued).

   Continuing the travesty, the city council itself admitted there was wrongdoing but ultimately dismissed the retired Loaves and Fishes center director’s claim in the name of whatever was masquerading as a police accountability review board at the time.

   After all was said and done, I understand from her longtime neighbor that the woman had to sell her house to pay for the legal fees (just off N Mississippi -- probably worth significantly more now and appreciating every minute). She moved out of state, reportedly is residing with her daughter in Tacoma. She lost everything.

   I’ll never forget the jurors’ self-righteous faces, so shiny and white, so sure that the old Black woman had oppressed the cop, so blissfully unaware that cops pull over Black people in North Portland and harass them for nothing every single day. Nothing like a jury of your peers. Good luck, man. L

6. Dave J. on 20 May 2005

   Wow, Lisa, that's quiet a story. Pretty infuriating. Those crazy grandmothers, man, they can sure oppress the cops!

   At the other end of that spectrum, though, lies my wife's jury duty experience, in which she was on the jury for a man who was accused of smuggling a large amount of heroin INTO jail. He had been arrested for simple possession (a joint, I think), and had not disclosed to the cops that he also had a pound of heroin sewn into the lining of his jacket. So, when they finally checked his jacket at the jail, they found the heroin.

   He was acquitted because one guy on the jury refused to believe that anyone would forget that he had a pound of heroin on him, and was convinced that the cops had planted it.

   I think your story is pretty outrageous, though. I feel really bad for that poor woman.

7. Jim on 20 May 2005

   I was called to jury duty several years ago and I was totally buried at work so I tried to get off by calling the appropriate someone at the Multnomah County Courthouse and claiming hardship. When asked for my boss’ name I told them Bev Stein, then County Chair. The woman at the Courthouse boldly scolded me – appropriately – and said I was not serving my civic duty, and such and such. Property contrite, I attempted to withdraw my appeal, but she said I had been relieved of my duty and it could not be reversed. “Take that you slacker” she was saying, and I took it to heart, vowing that next time it would be different.

   So when I was called again earlier this year I remembered the scolding and my contrition, and I cleared my schedule. I never made it to a trial because the case was settled out of court. But waiting in seclusion, for quite a while, with the other potential jurors was an experience that I value and will never forget. I discovered that – as best as the laws of probability could manage – we were a remarkable cross section of our community.

   I was a newly married gay man (this was before the Supreme’s ruling) and I thought I could pick out the lesbian vegan who would support me, but it turned out that she was, instead, a born again rocker. (The lesbian actually was the old lady who looked like my mom in a house dress.) Then the rag-tag blue collar waitress, who stormed in late with stories about how the stupid bus driver dropped her off late at the wrong corner blah, blah, was dressed down by the meek little African American man who was – you guessed it – a TriMet driver who told funny stories of how everyone always blames the buses.

   The guy in the $600 suit must have eaten 14 donuts and 4 people fought, quite vocally, about the rudeness (or not) of taking cell phone calls. A guy with a uniform and a gun came in and simply told us to “turn off all phones now or be in violation of the court.” Everyone complied and the arguments continued as if nothing had happened. Two women knitted and the guy with the knit cap played a video game. One woman talked for 3 hours nonstop. A few people never said one word.

   There was lots more like this, but overall I met some people that I might never have connected with in my typical day, and I am the better for it. Oh yeah, I got a recipe for butternut squash soup, then took the bus home. It was a little late.
   

8. anonymous person on 20 May 2005

   Noah,
   Thanks for the tip!

   I feel for you, Jim. I got called in the middle of the semester, and asked to delay until graduation, but that I could serve.

   They placed me on a date two days before I'd requested, and I told them that's no good, please call me a week later.

   So I get a call for a month later when I am out of town. I write a third time, telling them that this time is impossible, I am 3000 miles away. This time the deferral is *denied* (??)

   So now I get the official "This person can't serve it is an undue burden on his employer" (true in this case) from my supervisor.

   If there were just some way for the system to be more flexible ... (got to post this anon in case someone from MC court is reading)

9. Eric Berg on 20 May 2005

   My wife spent yesterday morning at the Multnomah County Couthouse before being sent home. It was the first time she was able to reprt for jury duty after being summoned several times in the past. She loved it. Having a laptop,she spent the entire morning catching up on email and surfing then had lunch downtown.

   I reported for jury duty in Multnomah County for the first time three years ago. Judge Ronald Cinniger was awesome during the minor criminal trial, which started the Thursday before Memorial Day Weekend, went through Friday, and ended when on Tuesday. I was impressed with the process and it left me with a much better feeling about "the system".

   We, the jury, spent very little time in the courtroom after the jury was selected and the trial began. Shortly after the prosecutor made an opening statement, Cinniger and the attorneys went into chambers. He allowed us to leave the building for an hour or so at a time, report back to a conference room, then leave again, and so on. This went on for a day and a half. Cinniger visted us regularly, thanked us for our patience, and assured that he was trying to work on something to get the trial going again or ended. I spent a lot of time reading in the park and a Seattle's Best Coffee and browsing Looking Glass bookstore, all near the courthouse. After the trial was over, he explained that the defendent changed attorneys and some stuff brought up in the opening statement wasn't shared with the new defense attorney. They had been spending the time dealing with this and working out a plea bargain. Cinniger invited us to ask questions about the process and give feedback on our experince. Several people who had served as jurrors in the past said that no other judge had ever done that.

   During the jury selection, Cinniger impressed me with not letting people get out of jury duty. At one point I recall a potential jurror who said he didn't think he could be fair because he had his house broken into before, and besides, he was busy with a project at work. Cinniger said something like, "Too bad. You will be fair. We all have stuf happen to us. Work will be still be there when you're done. It's just work. People died for us to live in a country..."

   Thankfully, at the time, I worked where employees served on jury duty and received full pay. This is one of the many reasons why collective bargaining is good.

   My only other jury duty experience was when I was in my late-teens in Marion County. During the selection process, when counsel randomly chooses potential jurrors and asks them questions, the prosecutor (who had on a blue and white striped tie--this fact is important) asked me something about bias. Somehow, after a few minutes of basic questions from him and basic answers from me about people giving biased testimony if they had spmething to gain or lose, I said something like, "And I can see where arresting officers could be biased. If they made an arrest, they obviously think the person is guilty."

   The prosecutor went into me, which prompted me to say, "Look. I may have a biased against prosecutors who wear blue and white striped ties, but this won't keep me from being fair."

   Before the prosecutor had chance to respond, the judge said, "Mr. Berg, you're excused. Thank you for your time. You're free to go home. I don't think we'll be calling on you for awhile."

10. M on 20 May 2005

    For jury duty, I had a gun pointed to my head. I also witnessed a public defender call white witnesses "Mr." and "Ms." while calling black witnesses by their first name. I also witnessed said attorney look at a black witness and repeatedly refer to the alcoholic beverage "Black Daniels."

    The public defender was also the one who pointed a gun to my head. Well, he pointed it in all the jurors' general direction, and I leaned over to avoid being accidentally shot. The gun was evidence, and the public defender was holding it up to be identified.

11. tomhiggins on 20 May 2005

    My wife had the duty last year. Yes, there is wifi and a few outletes ut go early if you want to get a good spot. She was not the first to arrive and wound up wating far far from a plug. She spent the day but was not called on.

    From what I can tell the wifi is WEP'd and the key is given out if asked for.

    Best of luck b!x. I know most folks look to jury duty with a sense of dread but I think you getting called up would make for some amazing observations on the whole process.

    -tom

12. torridjoe on 21 May 2005

    I've had two jury duty experiences, both in Virginia, with different outcomes, but both satisfying and interesting.

    The first time I got right onto a criminal sexual molestation case. It was an ugly one--a woman's boyfriend was accused of years of abuse on his girlfriend's mentally disabled daughters. Unfortunately for the prosecution, they had no physical evidence, and the girls' testimony was simply shredded by the defense lawyer (who, coincidentally, was the primary lawyer for one of the WTC I bombing defendants in NY at the time). I recall at one point he asked one of the girls where the rest of the family was, and she said the other kids were at school. He got her definitively to say what day it was, and then revealed that the day she described was a Saturday, so nobody was at school. It was sad to see a frightened girl with low capacities be led into being totally non-credible, but that was his job, and it was almost all of the evidence offered. There were four counts.

    In the jury room, I suddenly discovered (immodestly) how valuable my presence was. Some of the jurors wanted to use a preponderance standard instead of reasonable doubt (ie, they figured he "probably" did it, although they agreed the girls were not credible). Some others split the hair a different way, saying we should convict on just one or two of the charges, since we couldn't be sure. In any case, a guilty verdict was the near-consensus, based I guess on the extreme trailer-ousness of the whole family, and the fairly scary-looking defendant, mixed in with wanting to speak for the poor girls.

    The foreman and myself spent a lot of time reminding them of things like reasonable doubt and judging on the facts presented. We went from about 2pm to about 10pm, then came back again at 9AM and went until around noon. We returned as a deadlocked jury on 2 counts 10-2, and on 2 counts 8-4, if I recall right. I learned later the prosecution did not refile, because the family was not willing to have the girls testify again. I felt awful about the whole thing, but not about helping to hang the jury. The process doesn't work if you don't stick to the rules, IMO.

    The second trial was a traffic accident, and that's about all I know. I made it into the jury room, but before voire dire I asked for a non-religious oath. Rather, I did not speak the oath when others did, and said I could not swear to God. The clerk re-read the oath without the phrase, and that was that. But in an amazing coincidence, I was in the first round of no-cause objections, and my day was over.

    The jury room in Portland sounds like a dream villa, comparatively. Definitely bring reading material of some kind. And good luck!

13. torridjoe on 21 May 2005

    hey--funny true story about waiting for jury duty to come to you:

    In CT a little while back, court personnel discovered a curious thing--no one from Hartford proper had been called for duty in a long time. Not one. Something surely was wrong, but nobody could figure it out for a time. Turns out the programmer for the database had messed up the column locations, and the last character of the city field was shifted one space over in each record. The last letter of the city was now in the space for 'living or dead,' the code for 'deceased' being 'D.' The court's computer had assumed everyone from Hartford was dead.

14. allehseya on 21 May 2005

    The court's computer had assumed everyone from Hartford was dead.

    heh.

15. Anahit on 21 May 2005

    Love the bungling public defender story. Certainly no shortage of those.

    My fave: I was prosecuting a domestic violence case in front of a Multnomah County jury years ago and was in Judge Freeman's chambers for jury selection. Judge Freeman asked defense counsel who he wanted to bump and the public defender repeated "Um..." and "Uh..." over and over until the Judge and I exchanged extended "WTF?" glances and shoulder shrugs.

    Judge Freeman glared at the public defender and asked, "You don't know how this works, do you?"

    The public defender, who had been gazing at the floor, now looked up and sheepishly mumbled, "No." Judge Freeman was so exasperated he told me to teach this guy how to pick a jury and then promptly stomped out of chambers. Priceless.

    b!X, I've got Multnomah County jury duty on Thurs the 26th. Not sure what day you're going but I'll keep my eyes peeled. Guess I should look for the knit cap ;)

16. john on 22 May 2005

    My experience on a "small" MC criminal jury was something like the story below...everyone's expectations were shaped by "Court TV"and I found it very frustrating.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/21/AR2005052100831.html

    Defense, Prosecution Play to New 'CSI' Savvy
    Juries Expecting TV-Style Forensics

    By Jamie Stockwell
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Sunday, May 22, 2005; Page A01

17. clarence on 23 May 2005

    Response to Anahit:

    The 'bungling public defender' anecdote described could be typical of just about any attorney's first jury trial- whether it be private or public defense attorney, a civil attorney, or a prosecutor.
    Jury trials are one of those things that really (I mean really) aren't taught in law school. Its impossible to simply teach the art/science of how to try a case out of a textbook. The ability to try cases is something that is learned over time through experience... an experience that can be rough at times.
    So I don't know whether the defense attorney Anahit was up against in J. Freeman's court that day was on their first trial or not, but it would be safe to guess that the person was pretty new. I could hardly imagine Anahit's performance would have been any less bumpy his/her first time through.
    Which leads me to my comment about the theme jury duty...
    surprisingly, I've been a registered voter here in MC for almost 20 years and I've never been called for jury duty. I've tried several cases to juries, but I've never sat on one. Personally, I would love to. I think it would be a pretty valuable experience. (Understanding of course the tedium involved when the judge sends the jurors to the jury room while the attorneys haggle over legal issues.... over and over...)
    

18. Elaine of Kalilily on 24 May 2005

    I served as a juror on one Grand Jury and one civil trial in New York State. There were a string of cases before the Grand Jury, the biggest being a murder case, where the evidence was overwhelming. No problem there. The other cases were either drug or violence related, and all I could think about when I heard about the backgrounds of the various young people (most minority) accused of the crimes was that, my god, no wonder they're in trouble. They'd been cast aside by everyone in their lives, including the systems that were there to protect them. They never stood a chance to make it in this society. The DA was arrogant and paternalistic and never gave me a straight answer to any of my questins. I completed my service outraged at how the various government systems keep each other in business by virtue of their lack of virtue.

    Keep us posted, b!X.