OT: Jury Duty

Yes, there are several ways to play it. You can game the selection and vote your conscience. Many laws are unconstitutional.

A few years ago, there was a case in California under the three strikes law. A retarded man was accused of stealing a piece of pizza. If found guilty, the judge had to send him to jail for life, as I remember.

I know how I would vote, regardless of instructions. The law is heartless, and a jury has discretion, obviously.

How complicated is this "form" that you need help filling it out?

Perhaps you should prepare to participate in a jury? I'm a bit odd in that I consider it one's duty to serve on a jury. That's because I think it's important for everyone to see how the jury system really works and how screwed up it has become. There's also some karma involved in that should you ever have to face a jury of your peers, you may want some brains on the jury. If you were innocent, you would probably prefer a jury of intelligent logical thinkers. However, if you were guilty, the usual mix of illiterate, emotional, and clueless members of the GUM (great unwashed masses) works best.

I've served on a few juries and been rejected for cause a few times. The problem is that lawyers do NOT want intelligent jurors. This is your chance to have an impact on the system. Act stupid and impressionable and you'll be selected. Act intelligent and logical, you'll be dismissed.

During one jury selection, I was listening to other prospective jurors being questioned by the various attorneys. The attorneys would ask each prospective juror a list of about eight prepared questions. None of the attorney's or the judge seemed interested in the answers, except for the last question, when they all simultaneously came alive. The question was "What are your hobbies"? That seems rather odd, until I decoded the significance of the question. If they answered that they spent their spare time on something technical, cerebral, academic, or educational, they were deemed too intelligent and logical to qualify for the jury and were dismissed for cause. If they answered something that required little thought, they deemed suitable for jury duty. When my turn finally arrived, I answered ham radio, computer programming, and helping out in the skools. I was dismissed for cause.

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com 
Skype: JeffLiebermann     AE6KS    831-336-2558

They want prior jury service dates which I can't remember, so they looked it up.

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But wasn't there two sides to the case? If one side dismissed you, wouldn't the other side want you to serve? Seems dificullt for both sides to agree on prospective jurors.

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"If either lawyer believes there is information that suggests a juror is prejudiced about the case, he or she can ask the judge to dismiss that juror for cause."

every juror (in the US) should know about the right known as "jury nullification"

they will not tell you about this right, but you have it.

look it up.

Mark

Den fredag den 20. juni 2014 16.37.01 UTC+2 skrev snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com:

it's not really a right, it's more a consequence of other laws

-Lasse

On 6/19/2014 10:13 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

I have served three times, one trial involved several people going into a drug store after hours. The window was broken, but but the prosecutor could not prove they broke it, (didn't try). The people went in and stole many items, took it home sat around and decided to go back. The stole a whole bunch more more and took it home. While home, it dawned on these geniuses that there are drugs in the drug store, so they went back a third time and broke into the pharmacy section. They stole a bunch of drugs. We had special instructions regarding one witness because he was a hardcore heroin user. The trial only involved one of the thieves. Guilty! My second was a rape case, it involved a physically handicapped woman. We took a vote immediately and two said not guilty, one was me, but not because I didn't think he was guilty, I just thought we might have some discussion, same with the other. We had a short discussion, found him guilty, decided we wanted to get our free lunch, so we waited until after lunch to notify the bailiff we had a verdict. I'm have a metal block on the third trial, (it's been 30 + years). I have filled out a few juror request forms and in the last 12 years I've told them I'm self employed, husband/wife team and it would be an undo burden on our family. So no duty for a long time. Oh now I remember the third one, it was the OJ trial. Just kidding. Mikek

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I've been rejected more times than I can count. I think my ability to sleep anywhere helps... while they question other candidates I go to sleep ;-)

Back when smoking was allowed, my Sherlock Holmes pipe turned off many an attorney. ...Jim Thompson

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There certainly were two sides. That would make sense if I were prejudiced over some aspect of the case, such as being familiar with the defendant. However, the attorneys were dismissing for cause for what initially seemed random, but made sense in light of the hobby question. What they wanted was someone that is impressionable, inexperienced, predictable, not particularly logical, and not possessing any strong opinions. In other words, they want someone who can be convinced of anything, and is not equipped to question what is presented in court.

I also served on a voluntary manslaughter jury. One drunk bum killing another drunk bum with a single shot rifle. Defense claims self defense. Prosecution claims it was intentional. Jury gets to untangle the evidence and decide.

That trial is another reason why I recommend that you let yourself be selected for a jury trial. I was foreman (because nobody else wanted to be foreman). The initial vote in the jury room was 11 for guilty, and one for acquittal(me). It took about 5 hours, but I successfully demonstrated that literally everyone that testified was at least partly lying, seriously confused, or being intimidated by the police. I also demonstrated that from the angle of the bullet wound, the coroners reconstruction of the events was totally wrong. When I was done, it was 1 for guilty and 11 for acquittal. One person thought he was guilty because he had a young daughter and that a person like the defendent should not be allowed to walk the streets. I pounded on this juror for most of the next day, with no luck. The final vote became 2 for guilty, because one of the other jurors thought he could get a job with the juror that voted guilty.

When the vote was presented to the court, the assistant DA was shocked. He thought he had the case "in the bag" and that he would get a unanimous guilty verdict, based mostly on the jury selection. Instead, he got a hung jury, most of whom thought the DA had not proven his case. My guess(tm) is had I not been on this jury, that would have been the vote.

My personal evaluation of the jury is that it was extremely impressionable, with the one exception. He was probably selected for the same reason that I was selected. They ran out of available jurors and out of dismissals for cause. I took advantage of this in order to turn the jury around.

Again, I suggest you do the jury duty willingly. You might make a difference.

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com 
Skype: JeffLiebermann     AE6KS    831-336-2558

Reminds me of aunt Bee on The Andy Griffith show, she was the lone holdout. Then Andy found proof the guy was Innocent. Heartwarming. Mikek

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Thanks. It was quite real. It was in about 1994 so I would have a difficult time documenting it. At the time, I didn't think much of it, treating it more like a mystery than a matter of importance. That changed as I reflected on what had happened.

Well, that brings up another problem. If you don't bother to vote, you're not entitled to an opinion. If you can't be bothered drag yourself to the polling station or fill out an absentee ballot once every few years, I would not consider you even qualified to vote. In case you haven't noticed, there's more than just candidates on the ballot. If you like voting for the lesser of the available evils, you might occupy yourself with voting for how much money government is going to extract from your wallet, or how much deeper in debt are we going to sink.

It seems to depend on how desperate they are for jurors. If there are a large number of juries that need to be assembled, I presume they'll take almost anyone. If they have only a few jury trials and a large number of prospective jurors, they can be more selective. I've seen it both ways. I was bounced from one jury because I had done work for one of the attorneys. A few days later, I was bounced from another jury because I knew the judge. One of my friends was bounced from an embezzlement trial because he knew too much about computers.

I believe my method is more effective. Just act intelligent and opinionated, and you won't be selected. They don't like smart jurors.

Trial by combat might be more entertaining. It could even be televised.

That's the sad part. To me, it was obvious and easily demonstratable that everyone who testified was lying. What amazed me was that the other jurors didn't see it. I had no difficulty demonstrating the problems to them. Incidentally, I was the only juror who took notes.

Everyone lies, but that's ok because nobody listens.

I believe that they were accurate, beneficial, and non-prejudicial either for or against the defendant. I've been on three juries dealing with criminal charges. In all cases, the judge was very careful to lecture the jury on the difference between "beyond a reasonable doubt" and "preponderance of evidence".

What I found disgusting was the lack of concern for erroneous and misleading testimony. For example, the deputy sheriffs dispatched to the crime scene produce a time line that didn't agree with the 911 dispatchers log. The coroner's timeline was no better. Several witnesses from the campground where the shooting occurred offered other variations in the timeline. Unfortunately, whether the defendant arranged the killing or acted in hasty self defense, is mostly based on the timeline. The judge let it all slide by, leaving the jury to sort it out.

It gets worse. The defendant was grilled by the police after his arrest. Recordings of the interviews were presented to the court. The problem was that nobody could understand the recordings because the audio was buried under very loud 60 Hz hummmmm. Instead, we were given a transcript of what someone thought was being said.

During deliberation, we were allowed to inspect the evidence, which included the hum infested recordings. I had thrown together a quicky

300 Hz high pass filter and small audio amplifier the night before. Getting into the courtroom and past the metal detectors was tricky, but I managed. We played the tapes for about 2 hrs in the jury room which seemed to have swayed most of the jury. The defendants version of what happened seemed more believable and coherent than that of the various witnesses. Why his attorney didn't put him on the stand is unknown.

When the judge heard what was going on in the jury room, he demanded an explanation. I announced that we were "inspecting the evidence" which is allowed by law. The judge mumbled something about new evidence being presented that the court had not heard. The interested parties met for about 2 hrs and finally decided that since the transcripts would obviously match the recordings, there was nothing new being presented. Of course, the judge took care not to hear the cleaned up recordings so as not to notice that they were quite different from the transcripts.

BTW, the free lunches were quite good.

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com 
Skype: JeffLiebermann     AE6KS    831-336-2558

I always do it willingly but I usually say something they don't like. Once it was a criminal case involving a few gang members with shaved heads sitting at the defense table. They all looked ugly and guilty. The judge asked if I could render a fair decision and I stated I could, but when I see smoke, there is usually fire. The prosecution was happy and had no further questions and I was dismissed by the defense. Most criminal cases are just tests of the legal system to force the prosecution to prove the case, and if they make the slightest mistake, the defendant walks.

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And check closely the oath that you swear to when you enter jury service. You may find that you're violating your oath if you try to get judicially creative. Getting Held in Contempt of Court might be a consequence.

Mark Zenier snipped-for-privacy@eskimo.com Googleproofaddress(account:mzenier provider:eskimo domain:com)

So I guess I have to register, and then go vote for "none of the abov". And I do remember that movie...

When you got some guy's future, or maybe even life in your hands, that is n ot to be taken lightly.

I am a firm proponent of capital punishment. I think we need to excise from society those elements that f*ck it up. Like a cancer. Do you mourn a tumo r ?

But the problem is letting government administer it. The fact that even ONE person has been wrongfully executed is almost enough. you talk peole going postal,. drunk drivers or whateve cause of death, really, we don/t need wr ongful executions competing with accidents and hospital mistakes., (stay th e f*ck out of hospitals, and I MEAN it, 300,000 people a year)

Regardl;ess of that, I am not really swayed by statistics. They actually co me in under "damn lies".

Is the reason that jurors come from the rolls of registered voters because they figure they are more controllable ? Or just because they are lazy and don't want to use the census.

And BTW, don't give me that love it or leave it shit, and don't give this " if you didn't vote" shit. Look Man, YOU voted for this shit we got. That ma kes it your fault, not mine. I did not vote for this.

If anyone was out there worth i t I would have voted. They weren't. I voted , basically AGAINST what we got. So I CAN bitch about what we got.

You didn't think I would vote for Romney did you ? If he got in we would be in WW3 right now. Same with Hillary, but hopefully I think everyone knows that. At one point Rand Paul looked hopeful but not no more.

there is nobody to vote for a couple years in advance !

Whatevewr.

So, if that one person was your mother, wife, child..., it would only be almost enough to reject the death penalty. So, you're quite happy to have your family executed for the "greater good" of society.

One innocent being murdered by the state in an attempt to punish a potential guilty, is always one too many. Period.

If you don't understand this, please re-examine your moral compass.

Kevin Aylward B.Sc.

- SuperSpice

It is still your fault. Your sin is that of omission, not commission.

Dan

Only if you're stupid. You are not required, under oath, to disclose the reason for your decision. How is anyone going to prove that the government didn't prove their case "beyond reasonable doubt"?