I got summoned for jury duty today. It was an… interesting experience. Not nearly as glamorous as Phoenix Wright made it out to be!

For those who have never been summoned before, let me explain the process. A large group of people are initially summoned, given an orientation, and assigned to a judge. They are then taken to that judge’s courtroom where 12 names are pulled out of a wheel. Those 12 people have to sit in the jury box and be questioned by the judge and both the prosecution and defense, which is to determine if there are any biases or past bad experiences that would make any of the jurors unable to serve. People are weeded out, more names are pulled, and the process goes on until everyone is satisfied that the jury is impartial and unbiased. (In my case, this took 3 hours.)

There were about 60 people in my group. I was the very first person to be called as a juror. Keep in mind that as the first one to be called, the probability of being called was LOWEST for me. Furthermore, I had no reason to be excused– no past crimes against me and no previous jury duty. Even when the attorneys were questioning individuals, they each only directed one very simple question each against me. I guess I must look very trustworthy?

I didn’t necessarily want to be excused, mind you. I just found it amusing that nobody really ever had any second thoughts about me.

Some people had some amusing responses to try and get out of duty. Two people called upon their religion, saying that if the law clashed with their religious beliefs, they would follow their beliefs and disregard the law. Another person claimed he was more likely to believe someone was not guilty because he had a trial pending and wanted to be found not guilty. One person acted as though he didn’t understand the concept of “innocent until proven guilty”– when asked by the defense attorney what verdict he would give if there were 10 pieces of evidence saying guilty but one that left reason to doubt, he repeatedly said “guilty” even though the attorney very clearly tried to lead him to say otherwise. A few others used past experiences (they were robbed 20 years ago) as a basis for why they shouldn’t be selected, since they were angry about being robbed and might be more likely to believe the defendant was guilty regardless.

These people thought they were smart, getting out of jury duty. Little did they know that if you get excused, you have to go back down to the jury pool to see if any other trials need juries. Sometimes people are lucky and there are no need for extra jurors, but not today. Almost everyone who was in my group originally ended up having to go through the process again. I laugh at them.