Memories of possible jury duty, including laughter

A couple issues back, a concerned reader wrote in to give a voice to her opinion on the obligation the elderly have to serve jury duty, and the hardship involved in traveling, spending a day waiting to be selected, to be on a jury, or sent home. I can sympathize with her in that respect because at my point in life, I’m considered “upper middle-aged.” At my age a couple generations back, I would have been considered dead.

I’ve been called for jury duty three times. But jury duty is something we do in return for the privileges that benefit us as citizens living in our free American society. And as free Americans across the Nation and the decades, we’ve done our best by whining, sniveling, and coming up with a myriad of excuses to not show up at the courthouse, such as claiming you’re a convicted felon, or you were raised by a family of wolverines who were convicted felons, or offering to sacrifice one of your least favorite offspring if only you didn’t have to swim in the jury pool.

The first two occasions, I reported for jury duty, and waited with other patriotic souls who looked as if they were moments away from being snatched by Angel of Death. One by one we were selected, or rejected, until 12 of the most worthy were deemed intelligent and unbiased enough to render a verdict. Once that happened, the rest of us were sent away to dream of how we’d spend our $17 on its way from the county, compensation for a part of our lives will never get back.

Because I worked salaried jobs, I wasn’t losing anything other than a few hours of my rapidly shortening life. When I was summoned the third time, for some reason I began thinking it actually might be interesting to sit in court on a real jury and be one of those to give a thumbs up or a thumbs down to a hapless defendant. I mentioned it to a fellow pool member at lunch.

“No way,” he said. “This is a manslaughter case. You could get stuck here forever.”

“Oh, yeah.” I started picturing myself in a jury room, hopelessly deadlocked, while my children grew into adulthood and ended up in this very courtroom, accused of manslaughter. This jury business didn’t seem so interesting anymore.

Inside the courtroom, the attorneys were chewing up and spitting out potential jurors, to quickly drain the pool. It was beginning to look as if my number might be up. It was. I got called into the courtroom and sat with a half-dozen or so of my waiting comrades, across from the attorneys, the defendant, and the 11 selected jurors. It was down to number 12. Hopefully someone ahead of me will get accepted, I thought. Wrong. It was now my turn to go and sit on the witness stand to be pummeled by the attorneys for the prosecution and defense, while the judge listened in silence, doing his best to stay awake.

Note: What follows is an actual jury duty avoidance secret that I’m only sharing with you readers of The Voice. Repeat it to others at your own peril.

The defense attorney was first to grill me. After a couple of questions, he asked if I’d ever served on a jury.

“Just once,” I said. “I was on a grand jury in a movie.”

The attorney began his next question when the judge suddenly awoke.

“Wait,” he interrupted. “Back up a minute.” He turned to me. “You were on a grand jury in a movie? What movie?”

“It was ‘Howard Beach: Making the Case for Murder,’ based on a true racial hate crime on Long Island.”

The judge nodded. “I remember. Is there anything that happened when you were on that jury that could affect your impartiality in this case?”

“I don’t think so. Although once I did see state’s attorney Daniel J. Travanti hide the judge’s gavel so the judge was forced to pound on the bench with his fist.”

This response got a laugh from the judge, the attorneys, and even the defendant, maybe his last one for a while. It got me booted by the defense attorney.

That was more than 20 years ago and I haven’t been called since. I must have made a lasting impression on someone.

There’s the secret. If you want to get out of jury duty, get yourself a part in a movie where you can play a juror in a high-profile case. You’ll be home free with no whining, sniveling, or sacrificed children involved. And you’ll have a $17.-bonus to boot.

• Now for something completely different. A plug. Not a cheap, shameless, plug for my book that I occasionally add here, but a real plug for The Voice. If you’re not already a subscriber, I’d encourage you to become one. That way you won’t have to be bothering your neighbors by making excuses to get into their homes so you can snatch old copies of The Voice pages from the bottom of their birdcages. If you subscribe, you’ll have a fresh copy delivered to your mailbox each week. If you haven’t noticed, The Voice has not missed a Thursday publication during this pandemic season. You’ve been kept up to date on news and sporting events in our communities. So please, consider becoming a subscriber. Leave the neighbors and their birds in peace.