Blogging As A Barrier To Jury Duty
[posted by Justin Levine]
Called in for jury duty today in a criminal case.
I am not one who advocates making up excuses so that you don’t have to serve on jury duty. Patterico’s job would be rather difficult if everyone did that.
I’d be happy to serve and honestly feel that I could be fair and objective. However, I do advocate truthfulness as a prospective when you are questioned by the judge and attorneys. One of the questions that all prospective jurors were asked was “Are you close with members of any law enforcement agency, or do you come in contact with them at work?” (Not the exact wording here – but that was the gist.)
I suppose I could have pulled a Clinton and parsed the words of the question enough to forget about mentioning the fact that I blog for a site that is operated by an Assistant D.A., but I thought that would be a form of deception in terms of what it was really trying to ask me.
As it turns out, blogging for a site such as this happens to encourage defense attorneys to use one of their peremptory challenges. Go figure! I got the impression that my writings on this site were more of an issue than the fact that I produce and AM radio talk show and worked with LAPD Chief Bill Bratton’s wife when she was a fill-in host for a short stint.
Oh well. I hope and trust that justice will be done in the case – whatever result that might ultimately turn out to be.
Don’t feel too bad, Justin. One of the times I showed up for jury duty, the judge offered to excuse me before voir dire had even started.
nk (b63350) — 2/29/2008 @ 5:54 pmI read the blog and your writings, sometimes dropping in several times a day. And, generally, I agree with you and the DDA. Send me home, too, I guess!
ManlyDad (d62cf6) — 2/29/2008 @ 6:18 pmInteresting.
Patterico (4bda0b) — 2/29/2008 @ 6:34 pmNow, if you were a liberal, you could have stayed in good conscience (able to hold conflicting thoughts simultaneously), then blogged about it during the trial, brought it up to the judge, been dismissed, done the talk shows, written the book, then become the first male co-host on The View.
Look at what you missed out on. 😉
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 2/29/2008 @ 6:38 pmYou forgot to call him a racist, Staishu.
JD (8fd56a) — 2/29/2008 @ 6:45 pmFor some reason, handling litigated claims for an insurance company tends to get one excused from civil jury duty.
JD (8fd56a) — 2/29/2008 @ 6:50 pmJD lol, I was showing Phil how ignorant it is to call everyone a racist or xenophobe since any response can be disregarded. Think it worked?
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 2/29/2008 @ 6:58 pmYeah, I called Phil a racist just to get a rise out of him. I don’t know whether he really is or not, though his behavior is certainly consistent with that of certain people who are.
(This comment is also mocking the mode of argument he uses.)
Patterico (4bda0b) — 2/29/2008 @ 7:02 pmI saw your comment and ran with it. Was hoping not to get chastised before I could hit the punchline. If he hasn’t got it by now, he’s not going to. He’s convinced that if you believe in borders, any borders, it’s because you’re racist. I lost count of how many times he’s referenced the KKK.
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 2/29/2008 @ 7:13 pmI’ve served on five juries, which is probably because I live in a relatively small town with lots of lawyers. Attorneys, judges, and jurors typically know most people on any panel and if the parties excluded all the lawyers and/or everyone they know, there wouldn’t be enough left to make up the jury.
Frankly, I’m glad I got the opportunities to serve. It’s a real eye-opener and, oddly enough, it was the actions of the other lawyers on the jury that most surprised me. They were the worst offenders when it came to ignoring the judge’s instructions.
DRJ (d8934e) — 2/29/2008 @ 7:37 pmAnd that surprised you? I’ll tell you what wonderful patients nurses and doctors make sometime. 😉
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 2/29/2008 @ 7:50 pmMy daughter is a lawyer and FBI agent. She should get challenged instantly, right ? She wasn’t and wound up foreman of the jury.
I was in the jury pool in Newport Beach when we had a mistrial in voir dire. Pretty funny. The plaintiff attorney asked how many people in the jury pool had been sued. Every hand went up. Lots of contractors in Newport.
MIke K (86bddb) — 2/29/2008 @ 8:16 pmDang to think you are gonna miss out on all those free lunches and $17 a day for your services as well. 🙁
Bummer.
TC (1cf350) — 2/29/2008 @ 11:40 pmHehe…reminds me of the one and only case my dad was accepted as juror for….They ended up staying in the jury room for half an hour just so that they wouldn’t walk in, agree he was guilty as sin, and then walk out.
(Some non-drunk idiot raped a gal and tried to beat her to death. Amazingly open and shut case, and the moron still tried to claim he was innocent.)
Foxfier (74f1c8) — 3/1/2008 @ 2:03 am“your honor, the purpose of voir dire is to determine if prospective jurors have any bias for or against the specific parties and counsel in this matter. i am aware of the trend of lawyers expanding this to embrace every fact about a prospective juror that could possibly be knowable, so that his/her jury consultant can advise to accept or reject based on prejudiced stereotypes, and that courts generally abdicate their responsibility to protect us ordinary citizens from intrusive questions that violate our privacy rights, but i’m not going to participate in this trend. i respectfully decline to waste so much as a minute of my life submitting everything from my bumper stickers to my blog comments to total strangers for their approval. counsel will have to decide based on the limited information that 1) i’ve never met any of you before, and 2) if impaneled, i pledge to decide the facts without fear or favor. i am not a demographic, i am an absolutely unique individual, and i don’t care one way or the other whether i end up on this jury, and i’m willing to go all the way to the supreme court to uphold the privacy rights of prospective jurors. you can help me make history and achieve this noble objective by citing me for contempt now.”
assistant devil's advocate (c54259) — 3/1/2008 @ 10:32 amFunny this. Wasn’t referring to himself in the third person one of your points of ridicule and complaints against Cranmer? And didn’t a load of your lackies follow suit?
Hypocrite.
The Black Fingernail (c9fd65) — 3/1/2008 @ 11:17 amOnce again, you show your utter inability to read and comprehend English.
If you’ll check the byline of this post, you’ll find it was written by Justin Levine, not Patterico. So it’s perfectly reasonable for Justin to refer to Patterico in the third person, because they are two different people.
Maybe you ought to stop posting here until you can demonstrate some basic cognitive skills.
Steverino (2c9e20) — 3/1/2008 @ 11:44 amFunny this. Wasn’t referring to himself in the third person one of your points of ridicule and complaints against Cranmer? And didn’t a load of your lackies follow suit?
Hypocrite.
Funny this. Isn’t your status as a complete moron one of my points of ridicule against you?
Patterico (4bda0b) — 3/1/2008 @ 10:43 pmWas that Cranmer? Talking in third person (or sockpuppeting, I can’t tell) and saying you have lackeys? What’s the pay rate for lackey these days? And do I have to wear a mask like on the old Batman show?
😉
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 3/1/2008 @ 10:49 pmGood ol’ fashioned lackeys can be hard to find these days, so we true lackeys command quite a premium.
SPQR (26be8b) — 3/1/2008 @ 11:04 pmBut a mask would shade the color of my eyes. I mean sure, if it was cool like the Green Hornet’s, but I’d get one of those Kato masks… I just know it.
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 3/1/2008 @ 11:08 pmStashiu, I hope you mean this Kato and not this one.
Steverino (2c9e20) — 3/2/2008 @ 7:14 amOuch. I didn’t even have to click the second link to know I screwed up. I’m not sure I can forgive you anytime soon for trying to make me see that on a Sunday morn.
Keep it up and I’m going to link some Nancy Pelosi pics just for you.
Stashiu3 (c8e98a) — 3/2/2008 @ 7:19 am😉
See, here, and I was wondering if FaceBook or LinkedIn could keep me out of jury duty! (No, sir, I don’t know the defendant…but I know someone who knows someone…and my LI profile can prove it!
(Just joking, of course.)
Laura Bergells (632adf) — 3/3/2008 @ 2:19 pm