Ever since I turned 18, I have voted in every major election, and yet, I have never been selected for jury duty. I've been in NYC for a year and a half, and BAM, they get me.
I'd be lying if I wasn't a little bit excited. Sure, I'm damn scared of being picked and wasting my time in some stupid trial, but I'm also curious of the whole process, especially the interview portion. Unfortunately so far, it hasn't been much to write about (though I always do manage to come up with SOMETHING, *cough*).
My first day I made it here, barely on time, and entered a magnificient room with some impressive, if a bit faded and dark, murals of old NYC stretching across the walls. After gathering the required material, I made a beeline for the back of the room where I saw the internet hook-ups. I had come prepared! A friend had told me of this option, and I could think of nothing better than having internet while forced to sit in a room for hours and hours and do nothing but wait and hope your name doesn't get called.
Quickly I learned that this was Civil court, which I guess is fine. I'm uneasy about being a juror in general, since I am very uncomfortable passing judgement on some stranger which will likely dramatically affect his/her life forever. At least with civil, I wouldn't be putting anyone in jail, probably just deciding on fault and damages.
I was also deeply concerned with my ability to sit still and pay attention for long stretches of time. My ADD was diagnosed (again) by my current shrink, and he happily provided me with a prescription for Ritalin. My approach to Ritalin is the same as my approach to Dicyclomine, which treats my stomach problem -- only take it when you need it, which is fairly rare (I refill my Dicyclomine about once every 12-18 months). The last thing I want is another daily pill. I'm on a crusade to get off nearly all of them, but that's another blog. Anyway, now that I had the prescription, I did feel some relief, but still nervous. I have not taken Ritalin before (except for one successful experiment with a boyfriend's pills), just kind of suffered through long lectures and meetings, desperately doodling and writing notes to keep my mind "awake" and active. It's difficult to explain, but if I am forced to pay attention to one single thing (like a speaker) for a long period of time, it's like my mind winds down like an old-fashioned watch. It just ...slowly....starts....to fall asleep. And it's not even like I'm tired. It's a lack of stimulation, I guess. The actual advantage of ADD is the ability to be a fantastic multitasker -- something I've really appreciated and enjoyed in my various jobs which has demanded just that. The downside is lacking organization and focus, and appearing bored or sleepy during an important meeting.
So, now I have this prescription and I'm testing it out for the first time for jury duty. It seemed to work fine, which made me very happy, though I didn't notice any dramatic ability of hyper-focus -- I was still a bit fidgety and rather bored, but not only was I able to pay attention without falling asleep, but I didn't have that horrible restlessness of sitting in one place for a long time nor having that difficulty of getting comfortable and staying that way. This would end up being a real gift in the next several hours.
The first day I was called relatively soon, and with 29 other people, pushed into a tiny, windowless room. Being #24, I sat in a chair pushed up against the back wall, wedged between an old white woman, and a very old Chinese man who wore a rather complicated device to hear with -- the court official brought in some small box on a tall stand, almost like an old-fashioned camera, which somehow enabled the old man's hearing aid to work.
Soon the lawyers came in. They were almost caricatures in themselves. There were two lawyers for the plaintiff. The one who did all the talking was a tall, thin, black-haired Italian man who was rather charismatic and way too chatty for my tastes. We'll call him Vinnie. His sidekick was a complete creep -- a stout man, rather young, who had the eyes of that Runaway Bride woman, gigantic and round, as if surprised. And yet unlike hers, his had a sort of shocking intensity. He never seemed to focus on one thing, yet was always staring intently in one direction. It creeped me out a bit and reminded me of a terminator robot. Guess I'll call him Terminator for now.
The defense attorney was an older black man with slow movements and a voice like butter. In addition, his low voice had a lisp! It was such a strange combo, that I felt like smiling every time he spoke. Let's call him Ben.
We soon learned that the plaintiff had won the case already. Basically a personal injury accident where a man had been hit on the head by a falling brick at a construction site. Our job (if selected) was simply to listen to the evidence and assess damages. Sounded simple enough, until I learned the trial would probably take a whole week just to do that. Yuck.
Thinking, as I've seen hundreds and hundreds of Law & Order episodes, that the interview process would be fast, in a courtroom, and with a judge, I turned out to be wrong on all counts. We sat there, for nearly four hours, as time dragged on and on? What took so damn long?
For one, we all handed in our bio sheets which were methodically torn apart (giving copies to each lawyer), sorted by number, and then reviewed. During this entire agonizing process, Vinnie talked along, informing us of this and that, talking about the case, though making sure not to be too specific at all times. A couple of times he must have said something inappropriate, for Ben would ask him to step outside for a few minutes. It was so silly. And all this time, there was no judge.
Then, as Vinnie was going through, here and there he'd ask a general question to us all and if this would impair our ability to be impartial. Inevitably, there was always someone who feigned difficulties, and one by fucking one they were taken out in the hall with the lawyers to discuss it. This must have happened about 30 times, each time the rest of us sat there staring at our nails. And of course you could tell these "conflicts" were simply attempts to avoid getting picked, something I had expected I would do myself, but as I sat there and watched others do it, I felt so digusted with their completely obvious lack of honesty that I knew I could't bring myself to act that way. I didn't want to be on a jury, but I wasn't going to pretend that because one of my best friends was a lawyer that I just couldn't possibly be impartial!
Then finally, Ben spoke and talked about the case, smiling and having a laid back appearance, although he warned us that although we were all chums now in the room, back in the courtroom they were very willing to tear each other apart. He kept referring to the other lawyers as his "adversaries" which I found amusing and a bit strong. At one point he mentioned the entity that was being sued by the injured individual was a non-profit. That immediately got my interest, working for one myself! But as soon as the word "non-profit" left his lips, Vinnie nearly leaped out of his chair and dragged Ben into the hallway. It was obvious he was pissed and that was not supposed to have been said.
And honestly, it did suddenly affect my judgment. Although I am very sympathetic to injuries someone may sustain by the fault of others, working for a non-profit, and knowing how difficult it can be to simply survive, and how money is always an issue, it gave me pause in wanting to award a large sum in damages to the individual. But it was obvious that we were not supposed to know that and consider it, so I pretended to ignore it. But alas, one cannot unring the bell!
The only person who spoke aloud in the room about not being impartial was an extremely annoying woman I will call Miss Piggy. She had these really puffy cheeks and a turned up nose, and had put quite a bit of effort into her appearance, wearing lots of makeup and jewelry and styling out her blonde hair. She kept erupting into these tirades of laughter which sounded utterly fake to me, and just kept echoing in this diva-like guffaws, HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH! At one point, she raised her hand and said that when she heard that the plaintiff was a man who didn't speak English, that she had a real problem with that, making subtle, but obvious innuendos about an "immigrant" suing for money in a personal injury case.
WTF!?!?!?
She was also dragged out of the room for a talk as well.
Finally, with 10 minutes to lunch they sent us off, with no final answers. Since legally they had to let us go at 1pm, we were going to have to come back after lunch just to hear the final decision. I was pretty confident I wouldn't get picked anyway. I was #24 of 30 and from what I understood, they just started at #1 and selected people until they had 9 jurors (6 jurors with 3 alternates). I was sure they'd pick up 9 people before reaching me.
I went out and had a nice and long lunch with my lawyer friend. The stupid waiter at the Chinatown restaurant practically ignored us for 20 minutes, despite my various attempts to flag his ass down. This led to us getting our food rather late (I only had 40 minutes to eat by the time we met up anyway), and me being rather agitated. I was enjoying the lunch a lot though, as not only was the food delicious, but lawyer friend is always fun to talk to and I have seen him so rarely in the past 8 months or so. Recently, he has become an absolute powerhouse of knowledge on American politics, of which he seemed eager and happy to share. Luckily, I do love discussing politics as well.
A couple of times I hinted that I really should get going, but lawyer friend repeatedly waved his hand and pshaw'd me. "What are they going to do, fire you?" he joked. No, but picturing 29 restless people sitting in a room waiting for my slow ass wasn't an appetizing thought. Finally, we walked back, and I rushed back into the building, 20 minutes late! When I entered the room shamefaced -- everyone was there except for me -- I was relieved to see no lawyers. I was hoping though that they hadn't gone to the court official to report my absence. The old woman next to me leaned over and said, "I thought you had gone AWOL."
Shortly thereafter the lawyers entered to give the verdict on who'd be on the jury. Before that though, a couple more people had to be escorted out in the hall to talk about "scheduling conflicts." All these damn excuses!
In the end, ironically, it may have been one of these excuses that got me off. When asked if anyone had ever suffered a head injury, I raised my hand. As I may have mentioned in the past, when 18 and donating blood at my high school, I fainted and pretty much broke my entire face (and cracked the back of my skull). It was a pretty big deal, but in the end a lot of good things came out of it. Anyway, I think that may have been the reason I was not selected in the end. As they mentioned, they wanted to make sure people who had suffered head injuries could still be impartial.
But i was quite surprised though to see that there were jurors selected all the way up to #30, including the half-deaf old man next to me. Whatever! I was relieved to have slipped past the goalie this time.
We were then ushered back into the main hall where we sat for another hour or so before being let go early. Hooray! That wasn't so bad now, was it?
onths, probably longer, depending on how often you wear it (NOT how MUCH you wear!), so it's an investment of sorts. Give it a LITTLE thought and time. Once you pick one, you can stick with it for years -- it'll be your "signature scent." People will get a whiff of it and instantly think of you in warm and fuzzy ways (unless it's an ex-girlfriend, then one whiff will induce a split-second bout of homicidal rage). Besides, due to the fact that if you make the wrong choice, you're going to totally gross us all out forever, please, give pause!
re to you?" that's not only too much, but it's the WRONG cologne.
