The Modernish Father

Most of you know by now that I’m generally a pretty civic-minded kind of guy. I got a degree in political science because I actually found that kind of stuff interesting. I still get all excited about elections, government and stuff like that. I watch C-SPAN and the occasional city council meeting. I also think it’s important that citizens participate in their local governments, even if it’s just by voting and serving on juries when called to do so.

Having said all that, I now TOTALLY understand why people hate jury duty.

Last Monday, I headed down to our local courthouse annex to fulfill the obligation which my voter registration and driver’s license had thrust upon me. I was called for duty in a Justice of the Peace court, so I knew whatever the trial ended up being, it wasn’t going to be anything terribly important or interesting. But I got the card, so I went.

Before I get any further, I must make a brief aside about the county courthouse annex building itself. A couple of years ago, the county bought a large, soon-to-be vacated church that was right across the street from our ugly, ugly courthouse. They moved a whole bunch of offices and smaller courts over there, but they haven’t quite finished remodeling the building yet. It’s still a very odd mixture of church and state.

So anyway, I was supposed to check-in by 9 a.m. and I did so. They directed us all to go wait in the back of the courtroom until the big show got underway. I was kind of surprised by the mix of the prospective juror pool. I expected it to be a fairly representative cross-section of the local population, but it was pretty much just a ton of women wearing a lot of makeup, a smattering of extremely elderly men, and me.

Unlike everyone else in the room (who were obviously all seasoned pros at this), I forgot to take a book with me. I thought about whipping out my iPhone for a nice game of Mah-Johngg, but I didn’t want to look like I was text messaging or something when the judge walked in. I don’t know if JPs hand out contempt of court citations, but I wasn’t eager to find out. Let me just say, if you’re ever called for jury duty – take a book. Maybe two.

I noticed that the two ladies sitting next to me were extremely well dressed, but I didn’t think too much of it. One was reading the paper and other was reviewing one of the juror info cards they had given to all us. They both seemed fairly nice, certainly nicer than any of the other scowling faces in the room.

The bailiff popped his head in through the door and pointed at the two women next to me. “Uh, I think you guys are supposed to sit up front. Away from the jury.”

Apparently I had been sitting next to one of the defendants and her attorney for the better part of half an hour. We were already off to a great start.

A few minutes after that, the court clerk came out and had us all sign in again (I guess the lady at the front desk couldn’t be trusted or something) and went over our payment options. Let me tell you, no one will ever get rich off of jury duty. We had a couple of options as to what we could do with our minimum mandated state pay for the day ($6) – get it in cash, waive our right to be paid or donate those six bucks to a local charity. Being the charitable guy that I am, I opted to give my money to some victims’ fund or something. Almost everyone else in the room took the cash.

The clerk had little pink envelopes containing the cash that she handed out. Upon getting his, the old guy next to me opened it up and counted out both bills very loudly. “One… six… yep, it’s all there!”

Then he turned to me and said, “You gotta make sure nowadays. These folks lied to get Bush out of office, now they’re running the show.”

I didn’t really want to get into a conversation with him about presidential term limits or the unlikelihood of some massive left-wing conspiracy that encompassed both overrunning the White House and screwing old folks out of jury duty pay, so I just looked at him and nodded silently. That seemed to convince him that I wasn’t part of the evil global plot.

Then we all sat around for another half-hour. There was a lot of coughing, sighing and some other sounds that were not easily classifiable. The confused defendant and her lawyer disappeared into a back room. And with each relatively silent minute that passed, I really wished that I had brought a book. Any book. Even a phone book.

Finally, I’d had enough. I whipped out my iPhone and prepared for a nice, non-boring game of blackjack. And that exact moment the bailiff walked in to make us all rise for the judge’s entrance. He shot me a glare as I tried to quickly slip my phone back into my pocket. I knew it had been a bad idea.

The judge apologized for the delay and explained that of the two cases on the docket, one had already been settled that morning and the lawyers in the second case were negotiating at that very moment to do the same thing. But we all had to stick around just in case their peace talks blew up and a trial ensued. So we all settled in for some more waiting.

After a little while (time had really lost all meaning at this point), the bailiff came back in and said we could take a break out in the courtyard next to the courtroom. We all welcomed the chance to stretch our legs, but after a few minutes it became clear that waiting out there was just as boring as waiting in the courtroom. I checked my e-mail and made a few work-related calls. I spotted a vending machine and developed a hankering for peanut M&Ms. Then I realized that I didn’t have any change, so I just stared at the machine and tried to use the Force to get some free M&Ms. It didn’t work.

Fifteen minutes later, we were herded back into the courtroom. The bailiff’s update: there was no update. We had to keep on keepin’ on.

Finally, a girl in the front row of our seating area blurted out loudly, “Well jeez, this sucks!” And with that tiny little crack, the dam burst wide open and a flood of cranky, angry, tired prospective juror conversation flowed out.

I quickly learned that the silence had been a blessing in disguise. These people were all nuts.

The old money counter was pretty sure that the judge was a raging alcoholic, although he wasn’t exactly sure which particular judge he was. According to him, all the bus drivers for our local school districts were also alcoholics and many of them practiced satanism. Plus, he was trying to figure out how to get revenge on a Whataburger employee who had tried to cheat him out of money thirty years ago.

One of the women behind me was mulling filing a grievance with her HR department at work because they weren’t going to give her a paid day off for jury duty on top of the paid day off for President’s Day that she was already getting. Another guy admitted this was the first time he had ever sat on this side of the courtroom.

The best one, though, was the lady sitting directly behind me. I never got a good look at her and it’s probably just as well. She went on for a good twenty minutes with stories about her family’s courtroom experiences that, quite frankly, I wouldn’t tell another living soul. Brothers with drug charges, a fight over their father’s will, a nasty divorce that tore their family apart… no subject was off limits. And of course, when her kids were caught with drinking underage at a pasture party, they had been set up by the local police. All THREE times.

Finally, just before noon, the judge returned to let us know that the parties had finally settled on a plea bargain. After three hours of jury, what did have to show? A morning that had been totally wasted and nothing that even remotely resembled dispensing justice. I never even found what the charges were in either of the cases.

At least it all ended before lunch. I guess I could have been stuck there all day.

In honor of the old conspiracy guy, I grabbed lunch at Whataburger on my way to work. I’m pretty sure he was doing surveillance in the bushes by the drive-thru though, so I’m probably on his hit list now. Oh well.

So that’s my jury duty story. I’m kind of surprised that I haven’t been approached with a book deal or booked to appear on Larry King Live three nights next week. I’m sure they’ll call soon.