"Remain seated and come to order"
As of last Thursday, I am officially seated on a jury for a criminal trial. The trial Tuesday afternoon and is expected to last through Thursday. This means that I won't have to miss too much work, which makes me happy.
I'm rather excited about having this opportunity. Despite the common dread of jury duty, I've long thought it would be an interesting experience to serve on a jury. Ever since I started really getting interested in and studying philosophy, I've been intrigued by the fact that a trial is little more than an extended argument. The textbook in my introductory logic course even used the jury trial as its "gimmick"/theme.
I can't go into any details here, of course; we (the jury) are under strict orders not to discuss the case with anyone, not even the other jurors (outside the deliberations, of course). But once the trial is over, I might very well post some more musings. On the off chance that any of my readers have any questions, they should post them here and I will address them once my tongue is loosed.
Labels: Life update
posted by Martinez at 2:31 PM
3 Comments:
Sounds like fun. I hope everything goes well, with a satisfying conclusion.
Let me guess....one of the lawyers (during jury selection) gave the classic example of circumstantial evidence:
"You go to sleep at night with no snow on the ground. You wake up and there is snow on the ground. Though you did not SEE the snow fall, the circumstantial evidence gives adequate proof that indeed, snow fell during the night."
(I think they all learn this in "How to Appear Reasonably Intelligent 101")
I've seen 3 lawyers in action during my brief jury selection experience. Two of them were extremely snarky. I hope your observed ratio is not as cynicism-inducing.
Oh yes....did you get a quote from the defense lawyer attributed to Thomas Jefferson, something like, "It is better that 100 guilty men go free, than 1 innocent man be imprisoned." ??
No Jefferson quotes, I'm afraid. And we actually got a different example of the difference between direct and circumstantial evidence:
Direct: You see a man swimming in a pool.
Circumstantial: You see a man standing next to a pool. The water in the pool is disturbed, there is a trail of water from the pool to the man, and the man is wearing swim trunks and dripping wet from head to toe. You conclude that he was recently swimming.
The lawyers seemed intelligent and reasonably good-natured, but then the trial hasn't started yet. ;-)
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