I did my civic duty and reported for jury duty on Wednesday of last week. I was fully expecting a repeat of my many previous days of jury service. I would read and possibly be called into a courtroom for jury selection and be excused. I’ve never served beyond that. That’s what I was expecting, but this time was very different. And I’m actually glad it was.Now that the trial is over and my six days as a juror are over, I am free to talk about the case and my experience listening to the lawyers and witnesses and reviewing evidence and then trying to decide, along with 11 others, the guilt or innocence of a person. It wasn’t easy, but it is a fulfilling experience. It even involved a few empathic tears because on display was the raw vulnerability of the individual being charged with crimes by police who clearly had very little interest in finding the facts. The prejudice of some of the officers was on clear display and it made them sloppy as if a jury would agree that a drug-addicted convicted felon of color was likely guilty of everything they would charge him with. Thank goodness that this turned out to not be the case because the man charged demanded a trial and didn’t accept a plea bargain as so many others do.
The defendant had been the victim of sexual abuse as a teenager by a correctional officer at the California Youth Authority. As an adult, he spent 9 years in prison for drug possession, the amount now considered a misdemeanor. Leaving prison, he continued a tumultuous and highly secretive relationship with his abuser, even living with him in a house with some 86 guns that he as a convicted felon was prohibited from being around. That relationship lasted for 28 years until the retired officer suddenly passed away.
There were 11 charges against the defendant, many of which stemmed from the fact that the relationship though secretive, was easily verifiable if the police bothered to do their job. For example, is it burglary to enter a home you’ve lived in for 15 years when that home has all your worldly possessions if the landlord changes all the locks because they don’t know about you? Even if you’ve made an unsuccessful effort to contact that landlord so you can collect your belongings?
The book was thrown at this man. He was found guilty of a few things, like possessing a small amount of drugs and possession of a firearm and ammunition as a convicted felon. He didn’t steal the gun as they accused because his partner had placed it in the car and he discovered it there later. He was found not guilty of that charge and when that particular verdict was read in court, he burst into tears. We learned from the attorneys after the trial that he would have served about 35 years for that charge.
As it was, the attorneys estimated that he would likely be going back to prison for 10-13 years for the charges we found him guilty of. The surprising (maybe not so surprising) thing was that the defendant was looking forward to going back to prison to get clean and to get onto a fire crew to fight forrest fires. I’ve been saying for years, that we have a very broken criminal justice system and now I’ve seen it up close and personal and can confirm that some things need to change: in particular how we train our police to overcome the biases that lead them to over-police and charge people of color and the mandatory sentencing laws that deal out overly harsh sentences to non-violent drug addicts.
Hello, Juanita – I so enjoy reading your posts; this one was especially poignant as I reflected on my civic jury experience last year. I, like you, had sat through being called but never selected many times. I did, however, serve on a jury case charging of an individual of color of stealing a car and possession of an illegal substance, and while we found ultimately found the defendant guilty of the charges, there were many holes in the evidence and the defending attorney, at least in my estimation, did not serve the defendant very well. There may have been many reasons for this, but nevertheless, a member of our society was on trial seemingly had many other issues that were not considered in the trial (learning disabilities, mental illness) was poorly represented. What I found particularly disturbing, besides the rather inept attorney, was the jury. The membership of jurors was definitely not a collection of the defendant’s peers as we were all white and older; the foreperson was in his seventies or eighties and white. Immediately after being selected as foreperson, he proceeded to announce that the defendant was guilty “beyond belief” and that we shouldn’t have to spend any more time in deliberation. There was I brief pause until I spoke up about the defendant’s right to deliberation of the jury and that we needed to consider all issues rather than so blithely condemn someone. Others then chimed in, and we were able to fully discuss all of the issues relating to the charges. This experience was a powerful reminder: As a Christian, I am called to care for and advocate for my neighbor as we are all God’s creation, and I MUST ALWAYS SPEAK UP FOR THOSE NOT AT THE TABLE, NO MATTER THE COST. Thank goodness for a kind and caring judge, who debriefed us after the charges were delivered as I was still feeling a bit unsure of our final decision. What I have thought about so often afterward is the ugly presence of unacknowledged white privilege. The trial was occurring during last year’s presidential election, and the foreperson had made his views well-known with other jurors, to the point of which I felt the need to tell him it was inappropriate for him to be expounding upon his personal views when one candidate had won the electoral vote but the other had won the popular vote and this was neither the time nor the place to be sharing those views with fellow jurors. When I talked about privilege during the deliberations, he flippantly indicated that we were not to consider any other issues other than the facts in front of us, although the facts indicated the underlying mental illness and testimony evidenced a learning disability. All of this to ask: How did we get to this place as a society? Where is the caring and concern for our neighbors as Christ calls us to do?
While I am grateful that the officers and detectives involved in this case appeared to be professional and empathetic, I agree that there are cracks in our system of justice that need to be addressed on several fronts. Thank you for your thoughtful and caring posts.
I’ve long thought that the keys to healing broken spirits should come from rehabilitation, not incarceration. I was anti- pot, but as I learned about how this plant could be so beneficial, I’m open to changes in pot laws. Alcohol & people drunk on power is a much bigger problem. My anti-alcohol stance keeps me off Jury Duty. Your analysis of this case was compassionate. A broken, unevenly applied system of laws & justice is so wrong. Poorly trained police, profit prisons & drug company protections stand in the way of effective reforms. Bottom line: Money is in charge. Change is just a word. (my opinion)