The life took an unexpected hiatus for these two weeks. When I got the juror summons in the mail, I expected that I would be dismissed after one day. Our justice system doesn’t like anyone who might think critically, and usually everyone I know has been immediately rejected by the attorneys. I’ve never served on jury before, my name having fallen through the cracks of the system, and didn’t know that how very different the Grand Jury is.
First off, it’s a vestige of 11th century British justice system, but it doesn’t exist anywhere else in the world now, except a handful of US states, including NY, and Japan (Kensatsu Shinsakai). Everywhere else, the judge who decides what cases have enough evidence to proceed to trial. In NY, however, at least 12 people out of 23 (that comprise the Grand Jury) have to decide whether the case has sufficient evidence and provides “reasonable cause to believe” that the defendant could be accused, and then it goes to trial. Or, if 12 people decide there is not enough evidence under the law they gave us, then it is dismissed, which could happen even if we think the person might be guilty. So, it’s a kind of proto-crowdsourcing.
In theory, it has advantages – it compensates for possibility that a judge might be too conservative, or too progressive, or has a prejudice or a headache, and replaces it with a completely random sampling of population – and it is virtually impossible to get out of this, unlike regular jury duty. The only acceptable excuse is former felony conviction, or a medical reason, or verifiably poor command of English (they claim to know how to check).
There are a lot of strange idiosyncrasies, however, that no one can explain to us. For example, we are not allowed to know the law under which the accused is being prosecuted. If we ask, the assistant-district-attorney (who is presenting the case), will read us the law, as many times as we want (“chapter 3, section 4, subsection 2c, paragraph 5 etc etc) but won’t give it to us. Every legal definition we have to ask them (I wish they’d just gave us iPads with those definitions and non-legalese interpretations). Everything that happens there is surrounded by secrecy (all of this, however, is public information, and I’m not violating anything). There is a special language, and DAs do not behave a all like humans. If you ask a DA to remind or repeat something, he or she will have to say a minute-long disclaimer before saying anything “it is my recollection, and not yours…..in your decision you must use your recollection…etc.etc.etc.”. This could certainly benefit from more technology.
So, now, I spend pretty intense days with 22 other Brooklynites in a windowless room, with a few short breaks, listening to assistant DAs and (mostly) police witnesses, but also sometimes victims themselves, and the accused, presenting cases of poor people getting in trouble – mostly related to guns (that every time I think came from out of state), and also DUI and drugs and a few other things. So far, it’s been 17 cases after 1 week. It is unsettling to see videos of people being shot, and then seeing those people testify. I can’t say it shakes my faith in humanity, however. The diverse group that I get to decide things with are intelligent and (mostly) takes this very seriously. We are supposed to “turn off” our empathy and look only at the facts that have been presented. It is a job for machines. But I hope we will never get to the point where decisions about fates of humans would be made by machines.
tinfoilparachute 