jury selection

This is from 1995 but it was just a few months ago that a legal firm payed my sister and a group of other people to be part of a focus group to help them profile prospective jurors.


http://reason.com/archives/1995/02/01/juries-on-trial

..................."Or consider the issue of privacy. In a well-known California decision, a court ruled that a discount store unlawfully invaded the privacy of applicants for security guard jobs by asking them to fill out an off-the-shelf psychological questionnaire, even though 1) mental stability might seem to be a valuable trait in guards, who are apt to use physical force for which their employer is legally liable; 2) the store was not going to base its hiring decision on any one answer, nor release the results; and 3) no one had to apply for the guard jobs who didn't want to.

Contrast that with the treatment of Dianna Brandborg, the 48-year-old office manager from near Dallas who got drafted as a prospective juror last year. Like many jurors, she was handed a questionnaire curtly demanding information about her religion, political views, income, membership in controversial organizations, reading and TV viewing preferences, what make of car she owned, and so forth. Brandborg has lived with her husband for 20 years in the town of Shady Shores, and describes herself as "probably as law-abiding a person as there ever was. I've never even gotten a traffic ticket." But she found the questions intrusive and declined to answer some of them, asking the judge for a chance to argue that these matters were irrelevant to her ability to serve as an impartial juror. Instead, he summarily found her in contempt of court and sentenced her to three days in jail and a $200 fine, a ruling upheld on appeal. "We can't let jurors decide what questions they will ask and won't ask," a local law professor explained."..................

Wow, that sucks, something tells me that there are many around here that would end up spending a few days in jail...but maybe not, cause people can flip on a dime around here....but also perhaps the she got locked up by being too rigid, she could have answered the q's with I cannot remember etc.

But in fact this is a good thing and it should happen more, not because it is good in itself, but because there are many flaws in our systems and by having this issues come to a head, we are compelled to change things for the better, if this stuff happens at a low level, sometimes the abuse is not caught. A few hundred more instances like this hit the media and we can make some rules protecting jurors.

I bet from the us jury system perpective, that the us is much more racist than it really is, seems like everyone claims they will be getting off the jury by saying they hate blacks and muslims or whatever. I have said I decided the outcome before the trial and been kept on the jury. The system needs some more citizen oversight.

Thanks for making this public, if it is a real story.

When someone's life or financial livelihood is on the line, I think they have a right to ask potential jurors any questions they want. They, and the prosecution, ultimately decide who the jurors will be.

JSG wrote: When someone's life or financial livelihood is on the line, I think they have a right to ask potential jurors any questions they want. They, and the prosecution, ultimately decide who the jurors will be.

I don't think there should be a consequence for asking....but I also don't think that someone should spend a night in jail or pay money for not answering about their private life. If not answering makes them want to disclude her, then simply disclude her.

This is a lot like punishing the kid that finds a pocket knife in his backpack and reports it.....no one is thinking about the next time. It is already hard enough to find jurrors.

Plus another person's financial livelyhood especially is not worth me even sacrificing one bit of my privacy or my rights to not share what is going on in my head, or incriminate myself, as most activities will have some aspect that could be contrued as criminal now or in the future, I don't want to incriminate myself or demand that anyone else do so.

Also remember that some people are on juries because of civil hoha disputes, dragged from their jobs, pehaps even with significant consequence to their livelyhoods. The system is certainly flawed and could use some discussion. I know people that had to give up grand canyon permits they waited 15 years, their lifelong dream, for so that they could sit on someone's trivial civil jury over someone getting kicked off a horse. Not right, but quite common.

popcorn eater wrote: I know people that had to give up grand canyon permits they waited 15 years, their lifelong dream, for so that they could sit on someone's trivial civil jury over someone getting kicked off a horse. Not right, but quite common.

I got called for federal jury in Denver. We had a trip to visit my mom in Ohio already planned so I called and told them that.....no problem, they just rescheduled me. I thought they did that all the time.

I have had jury duty re-scheduled many times for vacations and such.

popcorn eater wrote:

JSG wrote: When someone's life or financial livelihood is on the line, I think they have a right to ask potential jurors any questions they want. They, and the prosecution, ultimately decide who the jurors will be.

I don't think there should be a consequence for asking....but I also don't think that someone should spend a night in jail or pay money for not answering about their private life. If not answering makes them want to disclude her, then simply disclude her.

This is a lot like punishing the kid that finds a pocket knife in his backpack and reports it.....no one is thinking about the next time. It is already hard enough to find jurrors.

When you are asked a question in voir dire and you don't answer the judge will instruct you to answer. If you still don't answer, you are held in contempt of the court and go to jail. The jail penalty is not for not answering, per se. It is for not following the judge's order to answer. At least that's my understanding.