Skip to main content

A colossal waste of time

jurydutyWas called to jury duty today , and as anticipated, I was called for the first jury pool. And it was a doozy.

It was a murder sentencing hearing. The guy's already been convicted, so I couldn't use my tried and true method of getting out of serving, which is the "innocent until proven guilty" approach. You see, I don't hold to that theory, since if that were the case, the person would not have been arrested, or even put on trial. There is obviously a presumption of guilt, or no one would ever face trial.

Normally this part of the trial is handled by the convicting jury, but in this case, the original death sentence was overturned, so unable to come up with a way to nip this in the bud, I had no choice, but to succumb to completing a 30 page, 270+ questionnaire.

I'm still feeling pretty good though, since I don't believe in the death penalty. All I needed to do is fill out the questionnaire, turn it into the court, and after a review I would be dismissed. The problem is that isn't exactly the procedure.

The procedure is fill out the form, turn it in, wait while court personnel review the questionnaire for completeness, and then give you a date to return to be questioned for jury selection.

You'd think the person reviewing the questionnaire would be required to search for some key answers like, "I can't be impartial", "I am against the death penalty", etc. to avoid unnecessarily wasting anymore of my time or the court's time. Of course that wasn't the case, and I have to return in two weeks to be questioned further.

Oh well, such is life, and such is our judicial system, something I will spare you all further comment on.

And so goes another lousy day in an otherwise lousy year.

Comments

Alan said…
Do you at least get paid $13/day?
Marc said…
$15 a day! The cost of living is higher here in CA.

Popular posts from this blog

Vaccine Mandates, what are they good for?

Not much, that's for sure! Simply showing evidence of receiving a Covid-19 vaccine (whether fake or not), does not mean you are protected from getting Covid-19, nor spreading it, if infected. We are all different, and too many of us, i.e. people who are immunocompromised/ immunosupressed, the elderly, or others for various reasons, do not [cannot] mount an immune response as good as younger and healthier individuals. What is evidence of immunity is a quantitative antibody test showing you have developed antibodies, and to what degree, either from natural immunity or the vaccine.  That is what we should be testing for. That is what is important. But for too long, many, i.e. the FDA, doctors, and other health experts discouraged people (and still are) from getting antibody tests, because there was little knowledge about what level of antibodies are needed to impart immunity to the virus. That of course is true, to some extent, but how can we ever find out [learn] the answer to that q

History IS repeating itself

I didn't grow up during the rise and fall of Hitler and Nazi Germany, so for me to claim it feels like those are the times we are living in now, must be taken with a grain of salt. But I have seen enough movies, and read enough history to know, if the times we're living in now are not akin to the rise of a Nazism and Facism in Europe in the 1930's and 1940's, then we're not far off. If you can't see the parallels with Nazi Germany, then you must be living in a different country than me. Republicans and other right wing extremists will stop at nothing to subvert the will of the majority, forcing their beliefs, that they are the superior race and have been appointed by God, to impose their will on America, while they blame all our problems on immigrants, blacks and Jews. As I speak, Mitch McConnell, and his minions are raising roadblocks to all legislation designed to help average Americans under the guise of fiscal responsibility. They condone violent and verba

Open letter to all Democrats

Stop the nonsense! Continuing to go after Trump, without any hope of getting a conviction, does nothing more than provide Republicans with an obstructionist dialogue (now that they have come up with the unconstitutional talking point) in addition to giving Trump much needed publicity, when we should be ignoring him. It's the pure definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result! Instead Democrats need to be laser focused on what is important to all Americans, i.e. healthcare, Social Security and Medicare, infrastructure reform, the Covid-19 vaccine rollout, to name just a few. And when you do talk about Trump, simply steer the conversation as to how the Trump administration botched everything, how Trump is responsible for the deaths of 400,000+ Americans, due to his inaction and the down playing of the pandemic, plus the deaths of 2 Capitol policeman during the insurrection Trump provoked and incited on January 6, 2021.