The criminal case of which I have been one of the jurors concluded today. It was my first trial case ever. It was a case where a defendant faced multiple serious charges ranging from endangerment, arson, aggravated assault, to conspiracy to commit murder and attempted first degree murder, etc... Alleged victims took the witness stand, as well as many witnesses called by the prosecution.
It was obvious to all jurors that the defendant was definitely guilty, but not of all the charges thrown on him. I took the responsibility seriously, hence lost a lot of sleep over this. It was stressful to argue back and forth with other antagonistic jurors over several individual charges. At times, I felt they were too soft on crime. On one charge, I was about to become a rogue juror, to cause a hung jury over just that charge. I knew that the prosecution would not bother to retry just that charge, hence it was simply to ease my conscience that I did the right thing.
Near the end, I decided to go along with the other jurors and not raised a ruckus, when I realized that the prosecution and defense do plea bargaining all the time. This means that from a practical standpoint, one should accept that absolute justice cannot be defined. One must be satisfied that a guilty defendant does not walk free, and that he might escape a few valid charges against him. The justice system is choked with cases, and I could not see myself causing troubles to add to that bottleneck.
What was so sad about this case was that the defendant, being a solidly middle-class citizen with a good job and good income, got himself in trouble by committing a pervert sexual act, and then compounding it with more crimes to cover it up, and ended up with attempted murder charges. How could someone be so stupid? It was all very sad.
Now that the case is over, I can describe it with complete details, but do not feel like writing more than the above. The sad evolution of this individual digging himself deeper and deeper might not be all that unusual to people dealing with crimes all the time. Still, it was all very sad for me and other jurors to see.
And by the way, the judge, prosecution, and counsel came over to the jury room afterwards to talk to us. The judge informed us that the defendant never made a serious attempt to plea bargain. Of course the prosecution bluffed him with all these charges initially, and then had to carry out the threat. It was a good thing for him that the jury did not find him guilty of all the charges, else he might spend the next few decades behind bar serving just the minimum time on each charge. He was pushing his luck all the time. How lucky do you feel, punk?
There is one thing unique about the AZ court system. The jurors are allowed to take notes. We then used our own notes during deliberation. I really do not know how one could remember all the details for a lengthy trial like this. We can also submit written questions while the witnesses are giving testimonies on the stand.
Now that I have my normal life back, I will continue to work on my RV to prepare for a longer trip. I may even do some w*rk to make a bit of money.
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