Turns out the trial presentation lasted about a day and we spent a couple of hours deliberating, so I only missed about a day and a half of work. I guess in the end it wasn’t that terrible of a sacrifice considering we were warned that the whole process might take up to 3 to 4 days.

After I got selected for the jury, I kept asking myself why I got picked and if there was something I could or should have done to prevent that from happening. Eventually, I figured that I had been honest and direct in my responses and questions to the attorneys during the selection process, and to have answered differently would have been less than honest. Considering the case itself had some flaws, the attorneys probably had greater or lesser considerations in mind than really being all that particular in jury selection.

The case itself was about a 19-year old Caucasian male who was being charged with resisting arrest. There was no evidence presented, so the case was made entirely through witness and defendant testimony.

The situation was that this teenager was with three of his friends in one of their father’s backyard. There was a call made to the police of a suspected burglary. The police showed up on the scene and one of the officers who was on plainclothes detail (and also a member of SWAT) jumped the wall to the backyard as other officers entered through the gate announcing themselves. Evidently, this one teenager ran around the corner of the house towards the front and then was confronted by police on the perimeter. The charge was that this teenager resisted arrest by running away, supposedly in full knowledge that officers were apprehending him.

I don’t really want to get into the whole discussion of what was presented in testimony or what we even discussed in jury deliberation. Suffice it to say that we ended up with a hung jury. If you would like to know more, ask me in person and we can delve into it further. What I would like to put down are some takeaways that I had over the two day process:

Inefficient but effective judicial system
Even though jury duty and the entire process of a jury trial is terribly inefficient in the amount of time spent and productivity lost, there must be something said to the effectiveness of the judicial system in not only convicting criminals but also protecting civil liberties in a sufficient enough manner as to create an adequate sense of law and order.

Power of the spoken word
I don’t think I gave proper consideration before to how persuasive people can be in how they speak. I tend to be very rational and give greater credence to ‘facts’. But it was certainly impressed upon me during the course of the case how powerful the voice of presentation can be, the facts notwithstanding.