How long does jury duty take?

13 comments

1. Depends on the trial.

2. Depends. You might be called in and quickly dismissed the same day if you’re not chosen. You might have a brief trial that takes a day or two. You also might be in a big high profile trial that goes on for months.

3. Jury duty current day: (these are for local county jury and may be different even in the same state)

   Night before, check website to see if you are needed. If not needed 3 days you are done.

   No such luck.

   Day 1: a 300 person zoom where some jury clerk takes attendance, calling every person’s name, instead of just checking that they are logged in.

   This and tech challenged idiots takes hours. Watch 20 minute film on jury duty.

   Day 2: show up at 9AM. Check in w clerk to prove you came. Wait in room.

   Periodically they call ~ 50 jurors to go to a courtroom to be interviewed to be on that jury.

   They tell you how long the trial will be. For criminal trials they select 12 jurors plus a couple alternates. The rest of the 50 go back to the main room.

   If not selected for a day or two you are done and will not be called again for 3 years.

4. Grand Jury iny state is 6 months.

5. It’ll probably say something on your summons about the minimum length of your assignment, since most people will have to rearrange some parts of their life while they serve.

   The one time I did jury duty, the summons said to come to the courthouse every weekday for *up to two weeks*, but I wasn’t selected by the end of the day on Wednesday of the first week and they had all the jurors they needed, so I was back to business as usual by Thursday.

6. My most recent letter from the county prosecutor’s office specified I could be called for jury duty for the month of July. On August 1st I tossed the letter with instructions and phone numbers in the trash as my month was passed. I would imagine this varies depending upon your area or state

7. Mine was a month. I was summoned and had to show up to court one day for an introduction to the whole procedure but I never actually served on a jury. After that day I had to call in weekly for a month to see if my group had to show up to court to actually serve on a jury.

8. I had to go once, only lasted a day.

   Showed up in the morning, got picked in a group to go into a courtroom. They laid out the basics of the procedure and the case and then began jury selection. We had a break for lunch and then returned to the courtroom. I was number 13 and they picked the 12 people ahead of me, so they sent the rest of us back to the general waiting area.

   By this time it was the end of the day and no more selection was happening. They told us we could go home and didn’t have to return.

9. It really depends on a variety of things, mainly which state you are in and what kind of a trial it is. And whether you are actually selected for the trial.

   In NY in my county, you are required to be available for a week. You may or may not have to actually report. The last time I had it, I had to report twice.

   I remember getting a notice about Grand jury, and I believe it gave something like a 3 month time period when you needed to be available. I actually had vacation planned so I was able to defer that.

10. It depends. One of my colleagues was supposed to be on jury duty for two days and it ended up being five days.

11. Ever since I started working for the local government I get called for jury duty as often as is legally allowed. I’ve had 4-5 criminal jury summons. All but one was for a single day because I got called in and not selected. I only got chosen once and that was for a rape trial that lasted 4 days.

    I got a grand jury summons, but wasn’t chosen, so that was 1 day. If I had been chosen, it’d be once a week for like 18 months.

    I’ve had 2 civil trial summons. For the first I was not chosen, so it was only 1 day. The second was a medical malpractice trial that lasted 3 days.

12. Depends on the case. It can be a week or several months. You have to wait until the entire case has been presented by both sides.

13. In most cases when someone says they have jury duty, they actually have “jury selection” where they sit in a courtroom, answer questions, and wait to find out if they’ve been selected to be part of a jury. In the two times I’ve gone, there’s been about 70 people and I think 12 (maybe 16?) were selected. So most of those called do not get selected and just go home. In those cases, “jury duty” is only 1 day long.

    If you do actually get selected, it depends on the trial and the jury type. Could be a few days, weeks, or even months in the case of a grand jury. Usually it will end up being 2-3 days a week, although I believe a grand jury is basically a “on-call” situation where they will call you at any point they need you during a 3-4 month period.