Jury Duty

So I got this letter about 2 months ago from the United States District Court that was a" Notice To Appear" for jury duty on January 22. I just figured that when I called, they would say that I did not need to come in. But they didn't . They said to be there at 7:40 on thursday morning. AAHHHHHHHHHHH. Then when I got there and saw that I was 1 of 40 people that were asked to show up that morning, I thought that my chances were slim of being picked as one of the 12. They had us all watch this movie about being a juror, then we went into the court room and the judge asked us to all tell about ourselves. It was real interesting to hear about all these different peoples lives. Anyway, after we told about ourselves, the judge asked some other questions, like if we knew any people in the court room or anyone with anything to do with this case. He asked if there was any reason any of us could not physically handle being on this jury. I was hoping he would come up with some reason that I couldn't be there.. I reeeeealy didn't want to be there. Camille and Olivia were here visitng and I wanted to be home with them! Then a few people raised their hands and had some pretty legit reasons for not wanting to be there. (Father dying, job interview, ..one lady said her husband had been laid off a while ago and she was the main provider for her family...working 3 jobs !) I felt like a big jerk for even thinking of asking to be let go. Then the Judge asked kind of a wierd question..."would you consider it possible for the cops to lie ?" The nice lady that was sitting by me said that 2 of her sons were police officers, so she had to say that she didn't think they would ever lie in court. Well that got her off the hook. So when it was all said and done, they called my name as Juror number 7. They took us all back into this jurors room and told us that would be our home for the next 2 days. After we got something to eat and freshened up, they took us back into the court room and began the case.

It was against this guy who had supposidly had guns in his posession, which was very bad because he was a convicted felon. They had the prosecution get up and tell about why we should find him guilty, ..it seemed quite simple and straight forward at the start, then the defendant got up and told us why we would not be able to find him guilty. The defendant was this skinny little blond girl that looked like she was scared to death. She started out pretty shaky and it went downhill from there. Her face was really pale and her hands were shaking so bad you could hear her papers rattling. She started talking slower and her speech became slurred. She said "Im sorry...I'm ok...I'm ok" Then she started falling backwards. The jury were the ones who could see what she was doing because she was standing right in front of us with her back to the court. We all hollered to catch her and the prosecution guy ran over and caught her as she went down.

They dismissed the jury while the EMT guys hauled her out on a stretcher. Come to find out that this was her first case and she had been up all night worrying about it and didn't eat any breakfast. She looked borderline anorexic anyway. So after everything had settled down, they called us all back into the court room. The main defendant lady stepped in and took over for her. They started bringing in different witnesses. First the police that had pulled him over told his story. Then other police that came for back up that night told pretty much the same thing. It sounded like this guy was for sure guilty from listening to them. Then the defendant asked them about the proof of what had taken place. Well the police car camera had been erased because this happened about a year and a half ago, and when they took him to be interogated at the police station, he said he didn't know how to run the recorder machine so the interview wasn't recorded there either. Then the guy that did the fingerprint testing said he couldn't find any fingerprints on the guns. He had all kinds of reasons why there wouldn't be any fingerprints but I think we were all starting to have our doubts in the way the police had handled this whole thing. Then they had the lady that was driving the car the guns were found in go on the stand. She was really a pitiful sight. She looked like she had really been through it. She was missing a few teeth and looked like she was actually high on something at the time. She admited to being high on meth the night they were pulled over(she was pulled over for almost hitting pedestrians crossing the street) She said she had been addicted to meth for 17 years and had been in and out of prison for selling drugs. She had a totally different story of where the guns had come from. When the prosecuter asked her if she would lie to protect herself she said yes...she didn't want them to take her kids away. It was very sad. Then even sadder...her mom got on the stand and told a totally different story about how her little girl had never done any drugs or had been in any trouble. Ya right. So there was two witnesses that were totally unbelievable. That was about all they had for the defense. I think we all just left the first day thinking that tomorrow they would surely have something to tell us that would help us know what to do. Well the next day they brought in another guy that was in the car with the defendant and the burn out lady. They brought him in in shackels and I was glad cause he was pretty scary. My seat as juror # 7 put me about four feet away from the witness stand, and you could literally feel an evil presence when he walked into the room. He had a shaved head and tatoos all over his arms and neck. Then when he talked he was even scarier. You could tell he had no respect for anyone there and didn't have anything to gain or lose by telling the truth. He told another different story, which was totally unbelievable. They brought in another lady that had been helping the defendant out for a while and letting him stay at her house while he was seperated from his wife. She was a pretty sad case too. No teeth and looked like she was about 20 years older than her 35 years. She told us that the defendant couldn't read or write and she had been trying to help him out. She didn't have anything to say that would help his case either. Then they had the police be questioned again to try and show proof of anything and you could tell the prosecution was getting pretty frustrated with the lack of evidence the police had to show. They both gave their closing arguments then the judge read us this 30 page report about how we had to have proof beyond reasonable doubt to convict a person. Then we went to the jury room to come up with a verdict. This group of people they had picked for the jurors was really interesting and diverse. There was a english teacher, a buisness man, one of the whipple brothers from the whipple heating and air conditioning, he was a real character and ended up being our spokes person. There was an older lady from St. George and one from Tremonton that had just got home from a mission. There was a really outspoken yuppie girl from the avenues. There was a meteorologist from Logan, an ex-gymnist, a lady that worked for the vital statistics, and a runner from park city. Anyway it felt like I had known them all before for some reason and we all got along really well. We all told how we felt about the case and it was good to hear that everyone was thinking about the same thing. The police had screwed up and even though this guy was most likely guilty, there was not any evidence to say that he was! It was the police's word against the defendant. We talked about it for about an hour, then all decided to vote not guilty.

We went back into the court room and handed the verdict to the judge. He read it out loud, then asked each of us to say if we agreed with it or not. The look on the defendant's face is something I will never forget. He just broke down and cried. His wife and daughter were cheering and he just sat there with his face in his hands crying. All the prosecution guys looked pretty unhappy with our decision, but I think they knew they didn't have a good case with out any evidence.

After, the judge came into the juror room and thanked each one of us for our service. We said our good byes to the fellow jurors and left. As I was walking to my car, I came up to the stop light, and there was all the family and friends of the defendant. They just kind of smiled at me, then the wife said "thank you" and asked me if she could give me a hug. I was like..sure! and she came and gave me a big hug. Then the rest of them came and thanked me and hugged me too. The defendant guy was just bawling again and thanked me and hugged me. Then I started bawling too. I guess I had been holding a lot of feelings inside during the whole thing and they decided to come out right then. dang it! One of his friends asked me why I had chosen "not guilty" and I told them there wasn't enough evidence to prove anything. He said they were all really grateful and they were trying to get their lives turned around and stay out of trouble. I sure do hope they will. That was an experience I will never forget. It was a great reminder to me of how very blessed I am to have been raised in a happy home by wonderful parents who taught me right from wrong. I know that people are the way they are for a reason. They don't just get to be like that without some crazy, bad, stuff happening in their lives to make them that way. I know that most of it is due to choices that they have made along the way, but you could just see the vicious cycle of the bad or absent parent...the son or daughter turning out the same way, then their children following the same example. So sad.