What to do with Jury Duty when you're on travel

I’ll call them Monday. But if I can’t get out I’ll be really radical when they call me in, hell I’m going to slip something to show my biasness.
So far when I want to serve they didn’t let me. It was a famous case too.

EDIT to add, I did some googling and in my County, Jury service is one day and one trial. I should be ok to show up the first day.
 
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We got a jury summons when we were in Spain. The only way we knew was because of USPS informed delivery - we could see the front of the envelope, but nothing more like juror number.

So DH finally after several tries was able to reach someone in the jury clerk office. He explained that we were overseas, and could just see the front of the envelope, so didn't know anything about dates, juror number, etc.

They just wanted to know when we would be home and promptly sent out another summons. Short window, as we were going to be leaving again in 2 weeks, but she said, no problem, the any trial wouldn't last that long. DH was able to get his juror number and sign in online.

It ended up that the new summons was a week earlier than the original! But that worked out better because we had just two weeks before another trip.

DH was selected for jury selection for a specific case. At lunch however, the court case was canceled. Woo hoo!
 
Fedup said:
In my haste to snap trave deals, I forgot I had schedule a Jury Dity in January. Not only that this is a reschedule of Jury Dutyy that I was called on while I was in Europe. Is it ok to reschedule again? Anybody has any experience with delay multiple times. Any penalty?
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Call them and tell them that you will be out of country (or state) and see what they say. Unless they ask, you don't necessarily have to volunteer that you made your travel arrangements after you received the notice of jury duty.
 
Fedup said:
I’ll call them Monday. But if I can’t get out I’ll be really radical when they call me in, hell I’m going to slip something to show my biasness.
So far when I want to serve they didn’t let me. It was a famous case too.

EDIT to add, I did some googling and in my County, Jury service is one day and one trial. I should be ok to show up the first day.
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Just say you believe in the right to exercise jury nullification. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification
 
Walt34 said:
Yes, it depends somewhat on how liberal the jurisdiction is and the "culture" of the courts there. In MD where I used to work she'd probably get away with it, at least once.

It is definitely not something I'd even think about here in WV. For sure, your butt is going to be in jail for some period of time.
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WOW.... that seem overly harsh....



Here they would not even prosecute, which means they would not arrest you... first, they have to prove you got the notice... now, calling up and saying you will not be here kinda gives it away, but if you never called...


I was wrong about the % missing.... it is only 40% who skip (see below)....


Jury duty isn’t something everybody aspires to and people often find excuses to get out of it. In Harris County, about 40 percent of residents who receive notices to appear don’t even respond.
​

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/...n-harris-county-are-showing-up-for-jury-duty/



But later in the article they say participation has risen to 34%... so one of these is wrong....


The percentage of people who appear for jury service after receiving notices has risen to 34 percent from 30 percent in 2010, which the District Clerk’s Office attributes in part to its ongoing campaign.
​

Now, they can get on you if they wish... this happened in Ft. Bend which is close to Houston (Harris County)...


https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/No-show-jurors-summoned-to-court-1932342.php
 
I’ll probably jinx myself, but both my wife and I have never been called for jury duty.
 
To wrap up this thread. I called today and per our county, I can change the Jury Service up to 3 times. So far I’ve only changed once, so they delay my date to 2 months later. All is good.
 
Fedup said:
To wrap up this thread. I called today and per our county, I can change the Jury Service up to 3 times. So far I’ve only changed once, so they delay my date to 2 months later. All is good.
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Fed have you put this new date in your calendar....:cool:
 
ivinsfan said:
Fed have you put this new date in your calendar....:cool:
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No, I’m not planning to go anywhere. I still get to change for the 3rd time. J/K
I’m waiting for the official note to let me know the exact date first.

Edit to add, thank you for reminding me. Somehow I didn’t receive any email yet for the new date, but I book the whole month as possible Jury Duty. I wonder what if they forget to change my date. I guess it won’t be my problem.
 
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Last time I was called for Jury duty I filled in the form online and was selected to go to a courtroom for a case. The jury selection process with the defendant and lawyers then did not pick me, but before we left the Judge said that her next case had a lot of jury "no-shows" so those of us not selected had to wait outside and join the other new candidates for the next case. There were not many new candidates, and I did get selected for that case which only lasted a day and a half.

That's a long way of saying that I have witnessed a situation of lots of folks not turning up.
 
When I was w@rking I loved being called to JD because a bad day at JD was better than a good day at w@rk. I also believe JD and voting are two of the most important civic duties.
 
Fedup said:
In my haste to snap trave deals, I forgot I had schedule a Jury Duty in January. Not only that this is a reschedule of Jury Dutyy that I was called on while I was in Europe. Is it ok to reschedule again? Anybody has any experience with delay multiple times. Any penalty?
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My mom just rescheduled hers due to my sister's cancer diagnosis. In hindsight she wishes she hadn't, had just got it out of the way instead of delaying.



Her thoughts were that sis needed help today, but in reality she might need MORE help tomorrow. But, yes in our state it can be rescheduled.
 
kgtest said:
My mom just rescheduled hers due to my sister's cancer diagnosis. In hindsight she wishes she hadn't, had just got it out of the way instead of delaying.



Her thoughts were that sis needed help today, but in reality she might need MORE help tomorrow. But, yes in our state it can be rescheduled.
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It’s sad to hear about your sister. I hope things work out for your family.
 
Judges love local government employees as jury members. They get paid for showing up by the employer and there are no work consequences for being away from the job. In both of my stints with local government I worked with people that were seated for capital murder trials. One was four weeks, the other was six weeks. At least one was sequestered for deliberations, which took several days. I got called a lot but either did not have to show up or was not selected.

Last time I actually had to go to court was in the early 90's. It was a high profile heroin trafficking case involving some really bad guys. Each defendant had an attorney and a translator, paid for by the taxpayers. I wanted no part of that, so when questioned, I made it very clear that I testified at various proceedings as part of my job and I trained others to testify. I fully expected one of the defense attorneys to use up a challenge to get rid of me. Nope, it was the prosecution that booted me. Made me think their case was not that strong.
 
Fedup said:
In my haste to snap trave deals, I forgot I had schedule a Jury Duty in January. Not only that this is a reschedule of Jury Dutyy that I was called on while I was in Europe. Is it ok to reschedule again? Anybody has any experience with delay multiple times. Any penalty?
Click to expand...

It depends on your state, and sometimes your county.

Get in touch with them now. Ask for a delay.
 
Bestwifeever said:
And what if the people arrested for just not showing up for jury duty could insist on a jury trial.... :LOL:
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From what I read it is contempt of court so no jury trial.... just a fine...
 
Alan said:
Last time I was called for Jury duty I filled in the form online and was selected to go to a courtroom for a case. The jury selection process with the defendant and lawyers then did not pick me, but before we left the Judge said that her next case had a lot of jury "no-shows" so those of us not selected had to wait outside and join the other new candidates for the next case. There were not many new candidates, and I did get selected for that case which only lasted a day and a half.

That's a long way of saying that I have witnessed a situation of lots of folks not turning up.
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Yea, I learned a long time ago to not hang around.... I was on a panel where a woman was going to represent herself.... she asked strange questions about religion and other stuff... I was not picked... went out to the hall and some others were talking about her... seems she was a regular in court for shoplifting and a bunch of lawyers outside were interested in what she was doing (none wanted to represent her though)...



So, while waiting a sheriff came buy and grabbed a few of us and took us to a room... said that some defendant had agreed to a plea deal so they had let his jury panel go but the lawyer was trying to pull a fast one and then did not agree with the deal, hoping to delay it again... the judge was not going to have it and told his bailiff to go out and get a panel ready... we had to sit for about 45 minutes but they did provide us with something to drink and donuts.... at the end we were let go... the bailiff said the judge waited until all the paperwork was done before letting us go so the lawyer could not back out again.....
 
I received a mailing saying I was selected for jury duty. The night before I was to show up, I had to call a number and we were given a yes or no on whether we needed to go the next day. I did.
The next day they brought a couple hundred or so into a room. Half were excused, the other half, me included, were picked for trials.

20 or so of us, I can't remember the exact number, were taken into a courtroom. 12 were randomly selected to sit in the box. The balance were alternates and seated in the gallery. Hours of questions took place and as the attorney excused potential jurors, another from the gallery got to sit in the box.
Well into the afternoon this process went and I was picked to replace a juror in the box. More questions until I finally answered a question in a way the one lawyer did not like. I was excused. Amen.

It took a whole day, no pay, no expenses. The good news is I am now exempt for at least another 2 years.
 
COcheesehead said:
I received a mailing saying I was selected for jury duty. The night before I was to show up, I had to call a number and we were given a yes or no on whether we needed to go the next day. I did.
The next day they brought a couple hundred or so into a room. Half were excused, the other half, me included, were picked for trials.

20 or so of us, I can't remember the exact number, were taken into a courtroom. 12 were randomly selected to sit in the box. The balance were alternates and seated in the gallery. Hours of questions took place and as the attorney excused potential jurors, another from the gallery got to sit in the box.
Well into the afternoon this process went and I was picked to replace a juror in the box. More questions until I finally answered a question in a way the one lawyer did not like. I was excused. Amen.

It took a whole day, no pay, no expenses. The good news is I am now exempt for at least another 2 years.
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I thought I would get immediate dismissal if I say I believe in the death penalty. I’m in California. But seriously, one time I said, I tried to be fair. I was dismissed. One time I said I was an engineer training younger engineers some of them graduates from Stanford. Immediate dismissal again.
 
I don't understand why I've never been selected to be on a jury. Once, I think I saw the plaintiff's and defendant's lawyers flipping a coin to see which one would excuse me. That might have been the time I was telling them of my ideas about changing the jury system. I thought they were impressed. I know that judge and bailiff seemed interested. Anyhow, they thanked me and told me to have a nice day (and not to skip taking my meds ever again).
 
Fedup said:
I thought I would get immediate dismissal if I say I believe in the death penalty. I’m in California. But seriously, one time I said, I tried to be fair. I was dismissed. One time I said I was an engineer training younger engineers some of them graduates from Stanford. Immediate dismissal again.
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In my case, the defendant apparently admitted to the crime prior to trial in a plea bargain and then backed out. The defendant's lawyer asked me if I would ever admit to something that I didn't do if there was an incentive. I said no. She said see ya.
 
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