Jury Service

My goodness…I haven’t had this rough of a week in a very long time. I’ll start from the beginning…last Tuesday (Sept 6th) I showed up for my Jury Duty. Riverside County residents have a “One Day or One Trial” duty when receiving a Jury Summons in the mail!  Many people do NOT appear, many have told me they rip them up and pretend like they never got the summons BUT I feel bad doing that. So I always go or attend to it for whatever reason.
The millions of citizens waiting to be called into a courtroom…(they say no camera’s in the courthouse BUT it was my phone NOT a real camera! No laws broken here!)

  Anyway…my jury “group” was to appear on the Tuesday. I waited a good few hours to be told that I was on 1 of 4 panels of potential jurors…right then I knew it was NOT good if they needed 4 panels of 50 people to choose from.  I was on a jury before, for a petty child molestation case (but it wasn’t like a little kid or anything)…so I was somewhat familiar with the process. We get into the courtroom, and I’m not sure if many of you have been actually IN a court room with the judge, clerk, bailiff, prosecution attorney’s, defense attorneys, the defendant himself…but yeah SUPER DUPER intimidating!  The judge proceeds to tell us that this trial was for a man being charged with first degree murder with special circumstances, that occurred back in 2002. If the special circumstances are found to be true, the defendant was up for capital punishment. Let me spell this out…This was a MURDER trial that was going to possibly lead to the DEATH PENALTY!

I’m NOT anti-death penalty…I have the mentality of an eye for an eye…you take a life you should give yours! I know that is very cold and inhumane to many, but with my past, my personal experiences, those are my feelings (sorry if that offends you!) BUT when the decision is actually presented in front of you it’s a little scary. The trial was going to start in October and finish around December 9th! Yes they said at least a 45 day trial. Oh man…doesn’t that sounds like a lovely way to start the holiday season off….listening to horrible evidence about a murder of a 13 year old boy by a suspected gang member??? I was NOT wanting to be on this jury…would hit a little too close to home. Murders aren’t my thing…and I thought as I filled out my 70 question questionnaire they would DEFINITELY dismiss me. I was brutally honest in my questionnaire. But no…they didn’t. I made it to the 2nd phase of jury selection which was on Wednesday September 14th!  BUT Hold up… Now let me back-track a bit.

On Saturday night…we went out…had a GREAT time with friends….actually a little TOO great! We were out celebrating our friend Delany’s, 30something birthday! Started with dinner at Logan’s Roadhouse and ended…

I’ll explain everything in a later post…but it was a severe sprain to my left foot…NOT ankle…top of the foot!!! So I left on crutches and in a LOT of pain!!!  ps. Did you know sprains take a HELL of a long time to heal…yeah I’m learning that now!

Anyway…back to my jury duty experience…For those of you that haven’t gone to the Riverside Hall of Justice, parking is a total B*tch around there…especially if you aren’t able to walk very well!!!! I had to park in the structure and walk on crutches 2 blocks to get into the courthouse! We got brought into Department 43 to be told all of the jury instructions for the day, legal terminology, etc. and what will be taking place. We were going to be verbally interviewed by both sides (prosecution and defense) about the responses on our questionnaire! yeah nerve racking!  BUT then my group is told to come back at 2pm…it was only 10am at this point. I would usually have been THRILLED but thinking about my raw armpits and making that journey BACK to my car on these stupid crutches and then again BACK to the courtroom after the break…I was almost in tears! But I did it. Met mother for lunch…so it wasn’t too bad.

So it was my groups turn to be in the hot-seat. The questionnaire asked a lot of personal questions but also lots of questions pertaining to gang members, gang activity, death penalty, etc. I wrote about my brother’s case, explained my fathers occupation (Lieutenant with LASD), my views on gang members weren’t happy, pro-death penalty! I should TOTALLY be dismissed…right??? WRONG!
So the defense attorney came to me…and it started. 
Def Atty: “So Mrs. Souza…tell me what you wrote about gang members in your questionnaire”
Me: turning red “umm…I don’t remember, something about me not liking them…”
Def Atty: “Oh no…please tell me exactly what you wrote…I found it interesting”
Me: “umm…go ahead and refresh my memory”
Def Atty: “Mrs. Souza you quoted “Gang Members are nothing but pieces of poop and a complete waste in our society”  Did you write that'?”
Me: “Yes I wrote that (kinda giggling) I don’t like gang members…I don’t see anything good from them and they are a waste of life”
Def Atty: As he is stepping backward, closer to his GANG MEMBER client aka the defendant, “So Mrs. Souza…are you saying my client is a piece of poop?”
AWKWARD!!!
Me: “Um yes I am…if he is in fact a gang member yes.”

So now you all know…if I’m killed by a gang member why!! It was the most horrible feeling ever…the defendant can see me…know my name, everything. I don’t feel that it is something that is ok w/ our justice system…do you??? And I STILL wasn’t excused. I was told to report back on Friday Sept 16th for the last and final stage of jury selection! ARE YOU KIDDING ME??????

That leads me to this morning…back to that stupid parking structure…walking that 2 blocks with my crutches…grrrrr. So annoying.  We all get into the courtroom…it was packed! They placed 12 people in the actual jury box and 12 more in the first 2 rows…those were “THE 24”. I thought I was in the clear, I wasn’t part of the 24! So the excusals begin…the defense and the prosecution get to take turns excusing whichever jurors they don’t want…out of the 12 in the box.  When one from the box is excused, the next one goes and takes their place. So 12 excusals…now for a new group to sit in the first 2 rows…and ERIN is in that group. Of course. I thought I was so doomed…BUT as my name was called to take a seat in the jury box…the defense attorney (who grilled me on Wednesday) said “I’ll save Mrs. Souza the trip…thank you for your service, you have been excused!”   I almost cried w/ joy!!!

Now…that’s been on my brain ALL week…the thought of having to sit on this jury…all the stress that was causing ON TOP of not being mobile…on crutches in pain! GRRR….what a week! But its Friday…and now I’m happy…still can’t walk…but I’m happy and in the clear for a jury issue for another year or so!! Thanks for all the kind words and support via facebook as I was going through this process…hahahaha