I did some research online, watched a couple of youtube videos that talked about it. The day before the summon day, as instructed on the letter, I called the number given to find out if there was any time changes or if I need to report. Sometimes they have enough people in the pool and they will dismiss you the day before. They did move the time to Wednesday at 1pm. So waited another day, called again, the message didn't change. I guess I have to report.
On Wednesday, my husband had to work from home to take care of kids. I drove 30mins to get to the Union county courthouse. You have to past the security line to get inside the building. Food and beverage not allowed, can not carry knifes, weapons. Similar to airport security. I was told to wait on the 2nd floor Jury room. I went upstairs, found the Jury room, there were about 15 people sat there already, each one holding a pink letter like mine. On 1pm, about 60 people showed up and then a Judge looks like in his 60s showed up, he gave us brief introduction of the procedure, called each one's name to see if everyone was there. He said he is flexible and if you do not want to engage on this time and want to defer to other time, you can do that. After he said that, about 20 people got in the line for deferral. So the pool shrank down to about 40 peoples.
Then we watched a 15min Jury video and we were sent to the one of the courtrooms. This was the first time I have seen the courtroom in the real life, not much difference with what I have seen from TV. The judge sat high up in the middle behind her desk. Plaintiff's and Defendant's table on each side normally seat 2 or 3 peoples: Plaintiff or Defendant, their attorneys, sometimes attorney's assistant or internship.
The pool of Juror candidates sit on the left side seats, the audience, family members, friends sit on the right side. After seated, the judge briefly introduce the staff on the court and told us it's a DWI case and then started the Juror selection. They randomly called 13 people's name from the pool including 12 Juror candidates and 1 alternate. The person who got called will stand up and walk to the Juror seats. I was nervous but I didn't get picked and it was relief. Each of the Juror candidate was asked to briefly introduce themselves: job, family status, where resides, spouse's job. Then they were asked if they know any people from the plaintiff and defendant's side. Then they were asked if they were somewhat related to the drunk people and if that experience would affect their judgement of the case. One Junior candidate brought up his son got killed in the DWI case and he was immediately excused. Some others have alcoholic relatives. So about 3 Junior got excused and the clerk picked another 3 people's name from the pool to replace them. Then both attorneys question the same things to the 3 new candidates, one of them got kicked out again, repeat the procedures until both attorney announce they are satisfied.
After Juror selection is done. The rest of the people in the pool were excused. But bad news was that we had to come back at 11am of the next day.
Thursday, I reported to the Jury room 30mins earlier at 10:30am because I had to get my mother in law to take care of kids and as a result I had to leave early so I didn't have to listen to her complaining about how messy our rooms were.
I sat in the court yard of the building, it was cool and comfortable. I think it's nice to work for government after 40's. Everyday's work is pretty set.
At 11am, all the people sat in the waiting room was told that we can be dismissed and come back at 2pm. There was no point to go back so I just walked to a Chinese takeout place nearby for the lunch. I met a lady who was in the pool there and I joined her for lunch. She told me she was the alternate yesterday and she was put back to the pool today and I was like " what?!" When we went back to the waiting room we noticed that some of the people who were picked as Juror yesterday showed up again. That's when we learned that all the people got picked yesterday were put back to the pool again.
At 2pm, we were sent to the same courtroom and underwent another round of Juror selection. It was another DWI case. This time, I was picked! I was really nervous when I sat in the Juror seat as if I was the defendant waiting for the tough interrogation. It took me about 10 to 15mins to calm myself down. The defendant was a young Russian guy that looked pale. He was not a citizen yet but a green card holder which might cause him more trouble if he was plead guilty. The defendant's attorney appeared to favor the Juror candidates who learned the 2nd language or had ever worked abroad. After Juror selection was done, we were escorted for the morning break. We met the rest of people in the pool who were not chosen in the hallway and they were delighted to tell us that they didn't have to come back the next day (Friday) because this was the last case of the week. From next week, they will have new pool of people report to the court house.
