Jury duty - playin' hooky from work

M

malkore

2
So I got called to Jury Duty. by law, my work cannot doc me pay or vacation time, but they can take my stipend ($35 a day) and then just pay my normal salary.

today I had to show up at noon. turns out we're not needed til Wednesday morning for jury selection...however they only found out 15 mins before today's appointment.

but since we're being paid the full stipend today, it sure doesn't seem right for me to go back to work for 5 hours AND hand over that stipend.

So I'm off this afternoon, heading to the gym for some cardio so I don't have to fight the after work crowd. its always terrible in Jan/Feb with all the 'new years' resolution' people hogging the parking and equipment.

by march they mostly have petered out.
 
Fair enuf bugger them! Thats the good thing about working for yourself you can do what ya want when you want....... some of the time.
 
Everyone complains about Jury duty. I think it would be cool and I've never been called.

My wife sat on a capital murder trial, that was pretty wild
 
Jury duty is fine for some folks, but not for self-employed trainers like me. I have sat on three juries, 1 felony assault, 1 dui, and 1 I can't recall. 2 convictions, 1 acquittal. And, I was jury forman on the assault case.:D
 
Its just annoying. I'm not that bummed about it. Turns out it'll be a criminal case, so it could be rather interesting.
Jury selection is Wednesday, so that's at least another morning off work, possibly the whole day and more if I'm selected to be on the jury.

Then again, I'm kinda busy this month, so I may give the head a clean shave and wear a shirt with short enough sleeves that my tattoos show. Then the prosecutor won't want me.

but if I do get on the jury I wouldn't mind being the foreman.
 
You have to show up at the courthouse for jury duty unless you are excused. Once there, your answers will definitely affect the likelihood of you getting picked for a jury. If you are not picked, they send you home but they could call you up again at any time. If you serve on a jury, you are exempted for a year or two.

If you fail to show up at the courthouse, the judge could have you arrested for contempt jurors.
 
g8r80 said:
You have to show up at the courthouse for jury duty unless you are excused. Once there, your answers will definitely affect the likelihood of you getting picked for a jury. If you are not picked, they send you home but they could call you up again at any time. If you serve on a jury, you are exempted for a year or two.

If you fail to show up at the courthouse, the judge could have you arrested for contempt jurors.
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I just don't get how they can make it stick. Don't they just send one letter? Mail gets lost sometimes
 
I know one guy who supposedly got out of jury duty because he said outright during voir dire that he doesn't believe in the legal system and he will find any defendant not guilty regardless of the facts. Getting out of jury duty probably depends a lot on the venue, facts, local laws, case strategy, background of juror etc.

Otherwise, I've never served on jury duty even though I've received several summonses and I got out of it because I was living abroad. I received the summons months after I was supposed to appear (when I was visiting the states and picked up my mail). I was totally paranoid about missing it but when I called the Court, they told me if I didn't get the summons, then I wasn't served and therefore, not required to show up for jury duty. So, yeah, seems like there a lot of ways to get out of it and I think certain occupations might have more of an advantage too (teachers, police officers). One of summonses I received was to sit on a Grand Jury and I definitely think I'll like to do it next time around.

Malkore, good luck getting Wednesday off of work!
 
They send two letters. one very early on, and if you don't reply, they send more and start calling you.

I actually got this one deferred from October, since I was going out of town for work and my 5 year anniversary.

They just called and moved it from Wednesday to next Monday at noon. Makes me think they are plea-bargaining or something, since its a criminal case.

If work wasn't so busy right now, I wouldn't mind being gone.
 
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