Jury Service

DesVegas

I just got finished mine last week, sent a 61 year old man to prison for twenty years for smuggling 190kg's of coccaine from Belgium into the UK in the back of his lorry, a whole pallet full.

I feel awful, poor bloke

Have you guys done any jury service?

In all honesty I was just happy it wasn't a child abuse case

munckee

DesVegas said:

I just got finished mine last week, sent a 61 year old man to prison for twenty years for smuggling 190kg's of coccaine from Belgium into the UK in the back of his lorry, a whole pallet full.

I feel awful, poor bloke

Have you guys done any jury service?

In all honesty I was just happy it wasn't a child abuse case

Did you try persuading the court that you needed to try some of it to understand how serious his actions were and what threat it posed to our safety?

DesVegas

i did munckee, and they let me, it was the real deal

VimFuego

190KGs? Damn, the police force are gonna have a good christmas party this year!!!

DesVegas

yep, and their case was awful, so many mistakes and so poorly presented

Wazmeister

I did a historical child abuse last November for 2 weeks...v difficult time.

EricTheWeary

No. Would happily do it. I used to be exempt but they changed the rules plus I'm no longer an officer of the court now anyway. 
And yes people find the child abuse cases pretty harrowing. 

digitalscream

DesVegas said:

Have you guys done any jury service?

Yep. Two cases - one false allegation of sexual assault, and one where National Rail falsely accused a train driver of stealing a couple of hundred quid with some really sketchy evidence. Both judges were visibly angry with the prosecutors for bringing the cases at all, given that there was blatantly exculpatory evidence in both cases.

Still, was a very interesting experience.

DesVegas said:

In all honesty I was just happy it wasn't a child abuse case

While our cases were going, there was another jury who'd been there for three months already on a multiple child abuse case. They honestly looked like shells of human beings, we really felt for them.

Gulliver

Yep - 2 months on a murder/perverting the course of justice/assisting an offender multiple-defendant trial.

I found it fucking tedious and phenomenally patronising.  We had under 2 hours of CCTV associated with the case.  It took 4 days in court to go through it - pretty much frame-by-frame as stills, then played at speed with the exact same information repeated.

octatonic

I'd be interested to do it but I've never been asked.

Timcito

I was called as part of a large jury 'squad' here in Miami earlier in the year. We were all herded into a room and then left to wait. After some two hours, they picked a small number of us and the rest they allowed to leave. Thank goodness. 

fretmeister

Gulliver said:

Yep - 2 months on a murder/perverting the course of justice/assisting an offender multiple-defendant trial.

I found it fucking tedious and phenomenally patronising.  We had under 2 hours of CCTV associated with the case.  It took 4 days in court to go through it - pretty much frame-by-frame as stills, then played at speed with the exact same information repeated.

Don't worry - as CGI / AI gets better the need to go through every frame will increase until we reach the point that fake CCTV is completely useless and indistinguishable from the real stuff.

BigMonka

I got a call up letter last week but have managed to defer it till September as I've got a planned holiday during my initial dates.
I'm quite excited about it, but also really nervous about it being something that is harrowing 

Dav275

Did it years ago in my early 20's. A couple of minor cases, where the verdicts were very obvious.

Found the process interesting, but lots of time just hanging around waiting.

Would not like to have to do a long/traumatic case though.

Musicwolf

Yes, a very long time ago (1990).

Bread stealing was a serious offence back then, so we were all glad when the judge ordered that he be transported.  Last I heard, he was heading up some sort of media empire.

SteveRobinson

I served in 2000, a mugging and a drug dealer both found guilty. 

fretmeister

Musicwolf said:

Yes, a very long time ago (1990).

Bread stealing was a serious offence back then, so we were all glad when the judge ordered that he be transported.  Last I heard, he was heading up some sort of media empire.

From the good people of "Terrible Maps"

VimFuego

a good tip given to me is if it's a case you fear may be harrowing or disturbing, there's a really good way of getting dismissed. As the defendant is brought in, just catch his eye and say "it's all good mate, the chq cleared". The rest sorts itself.

thank me later. 

euan

Yes multiple rape trial. Throughly makes me never want to do jury duty again 

CHRISB50

I’ve done it twice. 

First time nothing. 

Second time got a domestic case. Female allegedly stabbed her male partner after a night out. Found the whole experience very interesting.  

EricTheWeary

VimFuego said:

a good tip given to me is if it's a case you fear may be harrowing or disturbing, there's a really good way of getting dismissed. As the defendant is brought in, just catch his eye and say "it's all good mate, the chq cleared". The rest sorts itself.

thank me later. 

I sat through jury swearing in once, I had to work for a week in crown court and had nothing better to do. One of the jurors said something like "that's my cousin in the dock" and they excused her. Wasn't obviously any need to provide evidence of it.