Yesterday’s foray into the halls of justice only got me as far as the jury pool. Previously, I had spent three days splashing around in that pool, before I was seated on a jury. That trial made for a much better story. This time I was only in the pool for three hours. After all the potential jurors were registered, a judge came in to give us an orientation. That had not happened before. He first superficially outlined the process and then proceeded to launch into a diatribe about low jury pay. It starts at $11/day but then goes up to $18/day if you are seated on a jury. I was not this time, so in about two weeks I should get a check of $11 for three hours. At least I made minimum wage. Wait it is $15 now!

Three bailiffs followed. Each one selected between 50 to 80 jurors and then marched them off. The first one called us by our juror number. We all had a numbered tag, identifying us as jurors. The numbers ran from single digits into the six hundreds. Mine was so nondescript that I kept having to look at it because I could not remember it. He left with his eighty heads and a little while later the next bailiff arrived. He chose to call us by name, but as he went, he also counted off the selected jurors. Halfway through a juror came up and told him that he had called his name, but that that was not his number. I am glad that I did not get seated on a jury with that dimbulb.

After the third bailiff left, I counted the remaining jurors and figured there were not enough for another jury. Interestingly, when I called the night before, the recording told me to report but then excused jurors who had been originally summoned for Tuesday, which I did not think was fair. I bet that they later thought that that was a mistake, because they needed a fourth jury.