My blog is fixed and back up thanks to Jon Lunceford. It is probably for the best that I had a few days to reflect on my jury duty before I wrote anything because it really made me angry and it is always best to calm down a bit before you write.
I was sent with 47 other people to be questioned to be part of a jury. We each stood and told our names, addresses, occupations , spouses’ names and their occupations as per a sheet of questions we were each handed. Then the lawyers began asking for a show of hands for lots of other, more specific questions. I have done jury duty many times before but this was a bigger pool to choose from than I remembered and the questions were not specific to each person but general and answered by a show of hands. The defendant had 2 lawyers and a third person who was marking jurors on a diagram and watching us very carefully. The questions revolved around whether we had ever been in a wreck where we were injured and if we had ever sued someone before. Some of the answers reminded me of when I used to teach Sunday school to middle schoolers. You would ask for prayer requests at the end and it would digress into, “My goldfish has a cold” or “My dog has fleas.” Well, here were grown ups telling a courtroom full of people the most ridiculous things. One woman, in response to have you ever been injured and sued someone for it, told of how she fell down her own basement steps and broke ribs and her arm. The lawyer asked who she sued and her reply was, “Why, no one! Who would I sue, myself?”
Between about a fourth of the people either being lawyers or married to lawyers (is it just me or is it disturbing that in a random group SO MANY people are lawyers??) and lots of people who were injured and sued (about another fourth) and lots more who had a connection to State Farm (another baffling question since after all was said and done State Farm was never mentioned in the trial!) they barely had enough to get 13 people for the jury. Needless to say, I was one of the 13, since I am not related to a lawyer, never sued anyone and don’t have any connection to State Farm Insurance. The other potential jurors were told it was a slow week and therefore instead of returning to the jury pool the next morning they were done and could go home with the thanks of the court! But there I was- stuck for the duration.
Once the jury was selected we were dismissed (it had taken all day and it was late by court standards) and told not to talk to anyone including each other and be back in the courtroom in the morning at 9am.
The next day I was appalled to hear the facts of the trial. Luckily it only lasted for the morning and then we had a long lunch. We came back for closing arguments and deliberations. The case boiled down to a 43 year old woman whose car was hit at a traffic light on Hwy 280. When the light changed she did not go and the man behind her rolled into her. At first she wasn’t even sure she was hit and after examination the man’s car had no marks at all and her bumper had a nickle size spot of gray paint from his bumper. They called the police but never called the insurance. There was no reason, no one was hurt and there was no repair to be made to either car. So why were we in court? The next day after the “accident” the lady went to a doc in the box complaining about a sore back. (When we later saw the doctor’s report we found she had actually gone to the doctor for hemorrhoids and just mentioned having back issues. I have never heard of an accident causing hemorrhoids, but I am the first to admit I am not a doctor!) Four months later she decided to go to a back specialist and they found her back in bad shape, some bulging disks, bone spurs and a tiny tear. Did I mention the lady probably weighed upwards of 350 pounds and that she worked in a school lunchroom moving large sacks of flour and rolling out dough for rolls every day? And that the doctor said those two causes probably explained the bad back more than an accident that did not even scratch her car? Or that she decided to sue later when she realized the man was a wealthy doctor? Or that she never missed a day of work and told everyone she was fine including her back doctor after 4 physical therapy sessions? And yet she wanted $30,000.00 for her pain and suffering, plus medical expenses of $6,000 and gas expenditures that would keep an eighteen wheeler in fuel for a couple of years?
Once this case was turned over to us, I figured it would take about 2 seconds to find for the man so we could head home. After all, the woman herself on the stand contradicted her own lawyer and said she had had back trouble before the accident and a doc in the box record showed she had been in the office for back pain a year before the wreck! (Her lawyer went nuts when she admitted that and finally got her to say she was confused and had never had back trouble prior to the wreck.) But I was astonished to find that everyone was discussing how much to give the woman. They did not think she deserved that much money but wanted to give her something. As we went around the table I was shocked to hear people say, ” She lied on the stand and has no credibility- how much should we give her?” or “It seems pretty obvious she has back trouble because of her size and job, how much does she deserve from this?’ When they got to me I am afraid I rocked the boat when I said, “She does not deserve a dime! I am sorry she hurts but why should this man pay for it? There was no evidence that he did anything to cause this.” While I was talking, a strange misfit of a woman at the end of the table began muttering loudly over every word I said. I look at her and said, “Please don’t do that. You will have your time to speak and I will respect and listen to you. Now it is my turn, be respectful and listen to me.” Everyone looked at me and I have to say I was not sure where that came from. I hate confrontation and I am usually so quiet and agreeable. I think that college has given me more nerve and I am not sure that is a good thing!
People said, “What about her medical bills?” I showed where they said they were all paid by her health insurance that she gets through the school. Someone on the jury also worked for the schools and pointed out he has really good health insurance and it is very affordable. If her back was in this shape mostly because of work, then her health insurance should have paid it. She was out a few co-pays that added up to a couple of hundred dollars. I still failed to see where this man owed her even that.
Our first vote was 6-6 but after I talked they wanted a new vote and it was 10-2 in favor of the man. The two little ladies at the end said they would not leave unless we gave the lunch lady something. At this point I remembered something the man’s lawyer had said in his closing. They had figured her actual out of pocket gas mileage to the physical therapist and her co-pays. Her actual out of pocket cost was less than $1300.00. They had offered to triple that as a settlement and give her $3900.00, but she had refused. They said they were still willing to do that because technically if you hit someone in the back you are at fault. Although no harm came to anyone in the actual accident they were willing to do that. The woman’s lawyer said that if we gave her only $3900 they would consider that an insult and they would feel they had lost.
With that memory I decided once again to speak up. “I have a compromise to suggest,” I said. The strange little, muttering lady at the end of the table said, “And who are you to compromise?” I answered, “Someone who wants to find a way for us to agree so we can finish our job.” And she said, “I want to go home too, but what is a compromise?” I looked at her a moment and said, “What is my idea for a compromise or are you saying you don’t know what compromise means?” She did not know what the word compromise meant! I decided to just make my suggestion- I was too shocked to really explain the word. I said ok, what if we find for the woman and give her the $3900. I still didn’t think she deserved anything but could see we were deadlocked. (This way, the old ladies got to give her something, but only what the man was willing to give her and the lady and her lawyer would feel insulted and like they lost. I kept that part to myself.) Everyone agreed and I wondered who was really listening in court. I would hate to think my fate was in the hands of this group.
So we agreed, signed the sheet, wrote the amount, went back into the courtroom and read the verdict. When we did, lunchroom lady went berserk. She started screaming at her lawyer and at us and at the judge. She got louder and louder. We were dismissed, gathered our things and all fled the courtroom! In the hall I ran into a friend of mine from church who is the law clerk in the courtroom across the hall from where I was. She told me that people exploded like that in court all of the time. While I talked to her, lunch lady started down the hall towards me and I realized everyone was gone except for me and my friend. Just as my friend started to get me to the stairwell, lunch lady’s lawyer directed her into a conference room. I quickly left.
Usually I enjoy jury duty. But this experience disturbed me on many levels. First, that our courts have to put up with such frivolous lawsuits. That we as taxpayers are paying for that.That people on a jury are that uninformed and pay so little attention to the case. And that people want something for nothing and are willing to take it from an innocent bystander if the bystander looks like they have money. I am mostly appalled at how people conduct themselves! An eye opening two days that at times I found upsetting but in a twisted and strange way made me want to laugh at times as well!
