I found my jury duty service to be pretty interesting, so I thought I would write down my thoughts and recollection. It's all pretty random for the moment, I'll try and neaten it up later.
According to the material published by the Supreme Court of Minnesota, 90% of all jury trials take place in the U.S. THis is an interesting statistic. It makes me wonder if 90% of all trials take place in the U.S., thanks to our litigatious society or whether the right to a trial is just not available in the rest of the world. I have not yet been able to find a source to prove this one way or the other. (It looks like the state department web site has the material, but it's listed by country and I cannot seem to find a summary. I suppose I could write a little web scraper to help me summarize, but with millions of moneys typing away on the web someone must have done it by now.)
At least in the United States, assumming you are not branded an "unlawful combatant", you are gauranteed the right to a trial by jury in the consitution several times.
- Article III, Section 2, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution
- Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution
- Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution
- Seventh Amendment to the United States Constitution
It's also enshrined in documents like the Magna Carta, Federalist #83, the Declaration of Independance Section 19, and numerous other places.
The case I server on was a civil trial. Two plaintiffs were suing the manufacturer and dealer for and RV they had purchased. They experienced a problem and cuold not get the dealer to fix it, although they claimed they had tried to get it fixed eight times. They wanted to return the RV to someone.
The dealer never showed up to the proceedings at all.
The RV manufacturer put on a excellent defense.
In the end we found for the the plaintiffs. Why?
- We found the dealer and manufacturer had a dealer/agent relationship.
- The defense never sufficiently impeached the number of times the owners had attempted to get the RV fixed.
Was justice done? No I don't think so. It's too bad the owners never tried the manufacturer or another dealer. I am positive they could have been happily RV'ing around the country instead of suing people and staying in Minnesota.
I was surprised that some members of the jury didn't care much about the facts or the judges instructions but were obsessed with how they "would like to be treated", as if the trial were about the Golden Rule instead of the law.
The federal statute we were given, indicates that anyone who provides a warranty has a reasonable number of times to fix something or refund the money. This is handy to know. I would hate to have a dealer who fixes something every friday for three years until the warranty runs out.
Our judge was great, as he allowed us to ask questions. This was extremely helpful. I know I have read in the past that notepads aren't allowed in some jurisdictions. I don't know how people keep track of all the facts and timelines in a case.
If you are in a jury selection, saying your profession is "professional dancer" it's unlikely people will think you are a ballerina.
Here is a blurry photo I took of a helicopter hovering over my house. It was going back and forth over the same block, for at least a half an hour.
Boy, was this annoying at 1:30 A.M. I wondered if it was a training excercise, or a prison break from the Lino Lakes State Prison, or some sort of Homeland defense drill. I haven't been able to find anything from the local news.
People noted that you can't see much in the image above, so below is another version, where the brightness is bumped up and contrast is bumped down. It is not a UFO.
