I’m posting something a little different today. The material on this blog is normally related to legal or DRI matters, but its Friday and everyone needs a break. The following is one person’s recount of her day serving as a juror in a municipal traffic court. Its funny but it also provides us some (valuable?) insight into jury deliberations.
I hope everyone enjoys this as much as I did.
(By the way, I received written permission to post this.)
"Dear Citizens,
I wish I were a good writer because I’d really like to convey what an incredibly, unbelievably asinine day I had today as a juror for the municipal court of [City, State]. So please bear with me in my ramblings and read on if you dare.
“Call time” was 7:30 a.m. with no instructions on where to park. I parked in a nearby un-labeled lot and hoped I wouldn’t get towed. As luck would have it, I actually picked the right lot. My luck would soon run out.
At 8:30 the court was finally ready to seat “prospective jurors” in order by name. Mine was the sixth name called. The judge and the prosecutor then questioned us all en masse with some individual follow-up. The defendant did not have anything to ask us. She was a very pretty girl with amazing red hair and perfect skin, but several bricks shy of a load. She was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt with a ski jacket over it. Is that what you wear to court as a defendant? I guess so, when you don’t hire an attorney. Thinking I might get out early and go to work, I wore khakis and a nice button down shirt. Maybe the defendant was smarter than I thought.
After questioning ended at approximately 9:45 a.m., I was awarded the title of “Juror #4.”
My jury was excused for a half hour after being “seated” and allowed to go a break room that had no coffee (not that I care, but others were quite upset). The vending machines that were there didn’t take five dollar bills so I couldn’t get the strawberry Pop-Tart I had my eye on. Luckily, I had the sense to stop at McDonald’s on the way to court and get an Egg McMuffin. Unfortunately, that used up all my luck for the rest of the day.
After our break, it was hours before we actually went to trial. They had to seat all the other jurors for other trials first. Finally we went to trial! It lasted less than 30 minutes with only two witnesses and was extremely clear cut – at least for 5 of the 6 jurors. But one of the jurors was not like the others. This person will now be affectionately called – Juror #2.
During the trial, a police officer testified that the defendant failed to yield right of way when turning left and subsequently there was an accident. Later the defendant took the stand and testified to the exact same thing – except she said that she was going in a different direction than the officer said. (Thinking she would get off on a technicality we the jurors presumed.) In case you missed that, the defendant admitted guilt to the crime of which she was accused while under oath. (Somebody in our jury missed this the first time around, so I felt the need to point it out. During our lengthy deliberation we actually had to go back into the courtroom and have that portion of the testimony re-played so #2 could hear it for the first time!)
For Juror #2, the defendant’s admission of guilt was simply insufficient. She couldn’t give a guilty verdict in good conscience because she didn’t know how fast the other car was driving and where in the intersection the defendant was when the other car hit her. I think #2’s claim was that if the other car was going 90 miles an hour and the defendant couldn’t see them when she began her turn, then it wasn’t her fault that she didn’t yield. Or rather she didn't need to yield becaue she couldn't see the speeding vehicle when she decided to turn.
Juror #2 kept repeating that if a driver is “2/3 of the way through the intersection” on a “green ball” (i.e. no arrow) on a left turn they are alleviated of any responsibility. She said that was the law. But she couldn’t cite what law that was and the judge told us the only law we were use was the one put in front of us in our charge. (The law we were given didn’t say anything about speed or intersection placement). #2 eluded at some point in the conversation that she “knew a lot about the law” but never gave any specifics on that either. She couldn’t give specifics on anything.
All the other jurors tried to explain to #2 that if someone turns on a green ball, yielding is part of their responsibility no matter how fast another driver coming from the opposite direction may be traveling. I finally got her to admit that if we had evidence that the other car was driving the speed limit and the defendant’s car was only 1/3 through the intersection, then she would say “guilty.” The male juror next to me was flabbergasted. The five of us were incredibly frustrated. We were also tired and hungry since it was now approximately 1:30. We advised the judge we were at deadlock. The judge brought us back into the courtroom and let us decide if we wanted to break for lunch or keep deliberating. Amazingly, it was a unanimous decision to keep deliberating! After only a few more minutes of deliberation, it was clear we had a hung jury no ifs, ands or lunch would change that.
In hindsight, I think if the rest of us had said not guilty #2 would have said guilty just to be contrary. She remarked how she was “not going to be bullied” several times. (And that was not directly solely at me either – I had a couple of male counterparts in the room.) #2 had something to prove and boy did she. She proved beyond a reasonable doubt that she was an idiot.
She refused to recognize the defendants own admission of guilt and remarked several times how she felt the defendant was just a kid who didn’t know what she was doing in the courtroom. When Juror #2 was when called out on this (not just by me!) she said she “wasn’t feeling sorry for the defendant.”
So for a misdemeanor C criminal case punishable up to a $200 fine (no jail time even a possibility), our jury couldn’t reach a verdict. This was my first trial, or mistrial in this case, and I was actually thinking it might be a good - or at least interesting - experience. I really do believe in doing my civic duty and serving my fellow citizens, but justice was not served today. Five out of six jurors felt defeated. How do you debate someone who is irrational? Who ignores the law in front of them and ignores evidence? How do you convince someone whose name you don’t even know? I’m just glad it wasn’t a murder trial. I would be sick to my stomach. Instead I just have a tension headache and am irritated to have a lost a whole day without any productivity or fun. But maybe I just have the wrong attitude.
In the end, I guess the defendant obviously wasn’t so stupid after all. She got out of her ticket. She won. The losers were Jurors 1,3,4,5, and 6 and the city and its taxpayers. The trial cost at least $60 to pay the jurors their $10 daily wage, not to mention the salary of the judge, prosecutor. police officers, utilities, gas to get to the courthouse and the 42 man hours wasted. I want those 7 hours of my life back Juror #2! Or with a better attitude, I want someone like #2 on my jury when I get convicted of a crime!
But seriously, whoever heard of a break room without coffee?
Love, Juror #4"