Tell me about your jury duty but be vewy, vewy careful

Hey!!! :crazy_face: :crazy_face: :crazy_face:

Oh OK, I didn’t know that. But, just in case, will you appear for anyone if they get in trouble?

Following Bacchusfox’s comment I feel a little easier sharing one of my experiences.

Us jurors were handed a lever arch file (!) each, containing about 80 pages of notes in individual plastic pockets. We got called into the court room. The defence lawyer asked us to refer to page 70. I did so and then I noticed the old boiler sitting next to me hadn’t brought in her lever arch file with her. I whispered (jurors do that) “Wanna look at mine?” She whispered back, “Why? It’s all bullshyte.”

WTF? :open_mouth:

Long story short. First vote. 9 guilty. 3 not guilty (of which I was one).

Day 9. We weren’t sure what would happen if we couldn’t reach a verdict. The old boiler who had the two defendants guilty and hung from day one was on the verge of having a mental break down. The jury foreman called for a vote and even though none of the 3 of us said anything different from what we had been saying all along, this time the vote was 0 guilty 12 not guilty. True story.

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Got called up once in the 1980s when I lived in Melbourne (can now decline as I live in the country).

The large jury pool sat around like stale bottles of the proverbial for two long, boring days as no cases that required a jury bobbed up.

Mid-afternoon on the second day, the official read out about twenty names and told those people they could go home early and be back the next morning. They left with smug grins on their faces while those of us left behind were moaning and groaning about the injustice of it all.

When they had all cleared out, he then told the rest of us that we wouldn’t be required to come back at all the following morning, that we should form an orderly queue to collect our payment and that he had waited until the first lot were gone before sharing this news. We became a most happy bunch!

I told work I was in the reserve pool for the whole three days and thus scored another paid day off.

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Of course, I can look as crazy as Jack, so I have you covered.

I was on a Jury once in Sydney; drug case with 4 greek guys as the crims. Major undercover work by NSW Police and Federal Police; and these four greeks looked guilty.

One of the jurors was a guy from Nepal who had served in Gurka Battalion in the British Army, first day he told me privately that as he was a Buddist, he was not able to judge anyone so he could not find them guilty. Another juror was this cute young Greek Girl, who told me that one of the defendants looked like her GrandPa, so she could never send him to jail.

The evidence seemed overwhelmed and the case dragged on and on. There were hours of tapes played in court, and most were in greek so they had a translator: our Greek Girl would tell us that the translator was not being honest in what she said, and made it look worse for the alleged drug pushers. So we all started to take a more more critical view of the evidence, and it was noticealbe that often when the tapes reached a critical part, the sound disappeared and the police would tell us what was said which included the money handover.

After about 6 weeks of going every day to Court in Castlereagh St, arriving at 9:30 one day to find some very tough looking cops standing at the juror entrance doing a good job to intimidate us jurors. I told the foreman that it was not on, and he asked every juror how they felt. He told the Judge and the police were severely reemed out.

Anyway after 9 weeks, we got to decide and all 4 were acquited. They were probably guilty, but the police screwed it up, and the Gurku and the Greel Girl did not help !!

After so long, all the jurors had become friends, so I suggested we go and have a beer to celebrate our freedom. We went to the nearest pub, which happened to be the pub where the all drank. We retreated and went home and never saw each other again.

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At a guess, self employed.
I’ve never really gotten why people have such an aversion to it.
It’s something like 2 days every 5-10 years. You can manage it.

As I said, I actually love it.

The second case I was on was a freak show!! Such an obvious attempt at framing some poor innocent dude! Fair dinkum! The fact that evidence had been planted on him stood out like dogs’ balls.

The judge must have thought so too and threw the case out before we even had to vote!

Oh btw if you like the comedian Steve Wright, like I do, you will know he is not everybody’s sort of comic. One day when the jury had been sent to the jurors’ room and there was a lull in the conversation I decided to tell them a couple of Steve’s jokes. The other jurors (mainly female) looked at me like I was an idiot. A bit embarrassing. :blush:

Did you do the voice

Nah ha ha just told the jokes :laughing:

Mind you, It may have been a lack of judgment on my part telling the almost wholly female jury the joke “Hi, my name is Denise and I’m a nymphomaniac” :crazy_face:

I really can’t tell you.

I always thought you were an open book, but now it seems there is more to Diggers than what meets the eye. :wink:

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How good was d-gen!

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Because. You might be in the middle of something at work, or nearing completion of something you have been working on. That work either goes to someone else or just gets delayed. Then the work doesn’t get done correctly or you have to handle that work, and more, when you eventually get back. You lose touch with the workplace, miss opportunities etc

Being away from work isn’t the greatest when it could be for up to two months and completely against your will, without adequate time to plan.

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Not me on a jury but a true jury story.
Mates back in london, bang to rights guilty, caught with guns, 2 stolen cars, waiting to jump a bank delivery, caught at the scene, but car with guns does a runner and is caught later.
Jury goes out, comes back in and asks " Can we find them guilty of conspiracy to commit armed robbery but not actually committing armed robbery?" Judge threw a wobbly and practicality called the jurors idiots saying " But the police found the guns in the other car , wtf do you think they were doing?" Jury, ■■■■■■ at being growled at by the judge came back in and said " Not guilty your honour"
True story.

Yes, and victims and accused perpetrators of a serious crime need a jury to face justice properly.

The Penske file can wait.

I’m not denying that, but it can be a legitimate hassle for people.

It’s selfishness.

It is a community responsibility to do jury service.

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I am not denying that.

But I also acknowledge it can be burdensome, as any responsibility may be.