Genius of the Founding Fathers: Jury Duty

I just completed my first jury duty assignment. It's amazing I've been able to skate by for ten years of being eligible and never needed to attend. I got assigned to a criminal case and the jury selection was taking forever, and this afternoon I was sure I was going to be stuck for several more days and blam - the case got resolved by a plea bargain. Anyhow, jury duty mostly consists of waiting and it's a real pain in ass pretty much for everyone. But there is a certain genius in getting together with different members of community who you would otherwise have little interaction with and getting to wait around with the possibility of performing a civic duty. It sparks conversations about larger things and gives people a space to wax a little philosophical and to think about the justice system. The judge performs a big role in the jury process, generally giving jurors a little bit of a civics class recap and doing a little reminder of why we have the system we do and challenging people to perform a civic duty.

Being a slow and arduous process affords the opportunity to observe how different people behave. I developed opinions about some of my fellow jurors....

People I liked:

Old black man who complained about his adult children still being on the dole. We talked about USC, church, and basketball.

Cute, well dressed hispanic girl who laughed at jokes.

Incredibly well spoken and articulate black judge.

Middle aged hispanic man with moustache who befriended a group of older ladies.

Middle aged hispanic lady truck driver supporting three children on her own who dealt with sexual harassment at work.

Old white dentist whose father was an LA defense attorney.

Old asian lady who would run to the jury room to be on time only to sit around for the next hour and a half.

People I didn't like:

Young white guy with a BMW who only talked to the cute white girls.

Middle aged lady with a Marc Jacobs bag who insisted she could never find anyone guilty.

Young asian guy who would have trouble following a law he didn't believe was right. (The judge hammered him on this saying he didn't think the guy realized how radical a statement he was saying - that we are a nation ruled by law, not of men, and this is a system we all live under and ask to benefit from...)

Fat chick who talked too much.

Hippy chick who weaseled out of the second day of jury duty claiming she couldn't be unbiased in a sexual assualt case.

Middle aged hispanic guy who kept trying to get a special weasel out for financial hardship. (note: nearly everyone had a financial hardship)

Old man who kept complaining about everything and who yammered about weird things and kept trying to talk to me.

The defendent who was missing a lot of teeth and was being accused of raping and sodomizing a homeless woman.