Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Jury Duty
I got — perempted? Is that a word? They tossed me out on peremptory challenge. That means they didn’t like something about me. Was it . . .
A) The fact I have more than a high school education? Karen and I often wonder whether lawyers and prosecutors dislike professionals because we’re over-educated and opinionated.
B) My expressed opinion that a child endangerment charge should require some proof of actual endangerment — that the mere presence of a controlled substance should not constitute endangerment?
C) The fact I knew the defendant’s attorney but didn’t say so? She volunteered that I had taken care of one of her kids several years ago. I didn’t remember her. Correction: everyone looks vaguely familiar to me. The judge, defendant, and prosecutor all looked like they might have been my patient at one time or another. Just one of the oddities of my brain. But now I’m wondering if they thought I was a liar when I said I didn’t know any of them.
D) The fact that, whenever I wasn’t required to pay attention, I had my nose in Tamara Siler Jones‘s Ghosts in the Snow?
I suspect it was either A, B, or C, but I think D is the funniest option. Imaginary Q & A between me and the prosecutor:
Prosecutor: . . . So you seem to have some definite views on criminality. Do you have any problem with making a finding to uphold the law as stated?
Me: I don’t think I have a problem with that, but I would be more comfortable if you actually presented evidence of true criminality.
Prosecutor: “True criminality.” Can I ask what you mean by that?
Me [waving Ghosts]: Kinda like the perp in this book.
Prosecutor: Excuse me?
Me: The killer slices girls open from the chin to the pubic bone. Then he dismembers them, cuts out their organs, and eats ’em for breakfast. Now that’s true criminality.
Prosecutor: Judge?
Judge: Get the hell out of my courtroom, Dr. Hoffman.
Hee hee.
D.
Thanks, Doug!
Mmmmm. Yummy! 😉
What kind of sick would *do* something like that? Never mind what kind of a sick would write it.
but wouldn’t it be the defending lawyer that would say yo, dude! ??
some book. I can’t wait to add it to my TBR list.
Yeah, Kate, read ’em in order, not like me! (And if you think about it, the defense should love me. “Oh, the defendant only ran over his aged grandmother with a Humvee. That’s nothing compared to the hijinks Tam Jones gets up to.”)
Tam, I know you’ve written them as stand-alones, but I can’t help but think I would have had a deeper appreciation of Lars’s situation in Threads if I’d read Ghosts first.
Tam should advertise her books as a sure way to get off jury duty if they catch you red handed reading them. 😀
Doug, I think you’re right about understand Lars’s situation. I actually got Threads first, then couldn’t remember for 6 months to buy Ghosts. So by the time I got to Ghosts, I had more or less flipped through most of Threads.
It’s pretty cool that Lars’s situation is becoming blog fodder – Joely Sue Burkhart mentioned it too, recently, saying she’d forgotten bits of it between reading Ghosts and Threads. Let’s just say his problem gets even more, um, complicated, in Valley. 😀
You can never trust a cannibal, they always take a loving nibble too far.
I would think all of the above would make you an unlikely
juror (Oh now there’s an interresting title, The Unlikely Juror and a quick google shows it’s not used yet. excellent.) I’m reminded of Dick Solomon’s attempts to be accepted into a jury on Third Rock. One of my fav episodes.
Hehe.
I can’t really think of anything else to say, but wanted you to know you made me chuckle.
They were all probably scared you’d show up, interject common sense, and do their jobs better than they are. 🙂
~PJ~
This made me smile Doug. Thank you 🙂 And reason for not being selected, I suspect the education.
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