And can you share any of the details of the trial you helped with?

21 comments

  1. It was boring as all hell. Some guy being accused of dealing weed. He was almost certainly guilty but the police had done a very lacklustre job of proving anything and he wasn’t found guilty. My overwhelming impression of jury duty was massive boredom.

  2. My dad did. He couldn’t go into details naturally when it was in progress, but when it was done, he just said it was domestic violence and a baby died and hasn’t ever said anything more about it.

    I found some information on the case a while after and it sounds pretty horrific and hate to imagine what he had to see as a juror for the evidence.

  3. Pretty boring to be honest, it was a robbery and assault case with some Sudanese guy in woolwich crown court.

    If you have been through the system and know a bit about reading character you can figure out if someone is guilty or not within 15 minutes to be honest.

    The endless CCTV is hard to pay attention to because they can’t just introduce it by itself – plus the money wasn’t great either.

  4. It’s actually quite dull with a ton of sitting around waiting, but I had to view some fucked up imagery so at least I got a few mental scars from it.

  6. Incredibly dull and I’m grateful for it.

    Was a major case involving sexual abuse of multiple children. This was before smart phones and online newspapers. I had to sign something to say I wouldn’t watch, read or listen to the news, and attend everyday and wait around the court as some of the jurors already on the case were stepped down for whatever reason. During the fortnight I sat in that hot, stuffy room 8 of us were called through to serve on the jury. Now I know the case I’m so glad that I wasn’t

  7. I was on a jury shortly after courts started reopening following the first lockdown, so there were lots of extra Covid-related changes. For example, instead of the usual benches, we each had our own individual desks. It made some things a bit more complicated but given the restrictions of the time, the court dealt with it very well.

    I wouldn’t want to go into too much detail on the case. It was a double-murder which involved bodies being concealed for some time. Some of the evidence was very harrowing (the judge was very sensitive about this and giving us breaks after the worst of it), some of it was incredibly interesting such as the expert witnesses delivering almost mini-lectures on subjects like body decomposition and mobile phone triangulation, and some of the evidence was just extraordinary, such as the sequence of events that led to the bodies being discovered. The defence story was also extraordinary, as well some of the back-and-forth when the defendant was under cross-examination.

    It was a fairly long trial, about six weeks, and the responsibility really weighed on my shoulders but I would also say it was a rewarding experience. It felt like we were playing an important role and of course we were asked to make an important decision and everyone on the jury took it very seriously.

  8. Week one- really boring, I was happy just reading my book and crafting away but there was the one group of late middle aged women who clumped together in the middle of the open plan ~~holding pen~~ waiting area and had very loud conversations. Wearing noise cancelling headphones doesn’t really work unless you’re in a point where you can see the ushers for if they come out to call you so I was stuck listening to this bag’o’hags

    Week 2/3- actually in court, very active AC. WEAR LAYERS cause it can be cold but it can be boiling. Make notes. Make all the notes!! This can be serious shit, you want to be sure you’ve got things down so you can do the best job you can.
    You’ll have some deliberation time and you don’t want one individual to barge their view through, you’re supposed to form your own and if that means it’s not unanimous it means it’s not unanimous. Do tell people to shut up and sit down if they’re being pushy and do raise it with your usher if you feel someone isn’t listening and is just going with what the accusations are and going GUILTYYYYY

    Be prepared to potentially be weirded the fuck out when the person who you might be deciding is guilty of the crimes holds the doors of the courthouse open for you as you go for lunch.

  9. Mine was about a woman’s partner who shook her baby to death to get him to stop crying, he got 25 years for murder she got 3 or 5 (i forget) for child neglect.

    I found it super interesting seeing the process first hand, at one point the prosecution QC was grilling the guy on the stand so much by saying things like “why did you shake him to death” over and over. To the point where he broke down and said “I didn’t mean too” after denying it for so long. Never felt the air go out a room faster than that before.

    It lasted 7 weeks though and I was getting fed up of driving into Leamington every day.

  10. Mine was a theft case where the defendants were found not guilty
    My lasting impression was that the Police were incompetent in their presentation of the evidence and that the whole pricess could be dealt with in half the time if anyone was prepared to put a full shift in

  11. My Mum has done jury service

    My brother in law been called up but I think he got his deferred due to covid19

  12. Did it in September 2018, found it ok but I didn’t do as much waiting as others did. First case I wasn’t able to be on the jury for it so they moved me from the new court building to the old one for a drug and driving offence, one day we were sent home early due to one of the jurors not showing and at the end of it they had let me go earlier than normal as they could get a case for me. The main pain was the travel as it was an hours bus ride to and from th court on A roads

  13. There was a lot of waiting and it was very boring at times.

    I was sworn into three trials in 2w. First was criminal damage and assault which was only very loosely circumstantially evidenced so he was found NG, despite it being likely he did actually do it.

    Second was a fraud case where the financial evidence was extensive and indisputable although quite complex, she was found G. It was heavy going and not all the jurors had the basic financial understanding required to follow the evidence fully but they were lead by the other jurors who could.

    Lastly, got sworn onto what was predicted to be a long-ish trial of 3 defendants for burglary/kidnap/rape (can’t recall the exact charges as it’s been almost 20y and I’ve tried hard to forget). Opening statements were heard on the first day – the defendants had different counsel so this took the best part of the day. Before the next day, one of the defendants had changed their plea to guilty and we were released for a new trial to be set for the remaining defendants. It was a huge relief. I wasn’t looking forward to hearing more details and seeing evidence from what was a horrible crime and I was also really worried about being absent from work for another month. In the end they all went to prison, although they’ll have long since been released unfortunately.

    I was looking forward to doing it, but I am very glad I haven’t been called again since.

  14. I haven’t done jury service but I have spent many hours in the witness box.

    I attended the Old Bailey for a murder trial. I remember looking at the jury, thinking how young and poorly dressed they were.

    Then, after giving my account, saw these questionable young women, running around the corridors and jumping in lifts, chasing each other, laughing like hyenas. One spotted a police officer and, as the lift doors closed, shouted “”Fuck da police”

    The accused got a “not guilty” despite the overwhelming evidence.

    I was not surprised.

  15. The most boring thing I’ve ever had to sit through.

    Neighbours dispute over bins or something, resulted in them having a fight in the street then one of them stole the others fence.

  16. Was a strange case and monumentally boring as an 18 year old. Fell asleep numerous times in court, seated right next to the judge…. I wasn’t really mature enough to fully comprehend the situation in its entirety at that age

  17. Boring, good lord is it boring.

    You sit around in the waiting area for hours, or days before you go in. We kept going in right at the end of the day, literally 30 minutes and they’d adjourn. I was kinda “lucky” in that I was still technically working, they couldn’t cover for me. So I had my laptop and worked in the downtime.

    What I thought was interesting was the LACK of things to help the system. In the US I’ve been watching a lot of the live streams, and they have a person transcribing everything that’s said. It’s recorded too. And yet here, we have nothing. We had to rely on what we remember or made notes on. That was it. In deliberation I had to correct a couple of people on facts as they got parts mixed up.

    The defense had nothing so just attempted to discredit a witness, saying his testimony wasn’t detailed enough because he couldn’t remember silly facts like “Was the street lights on?”

    Because who the fuck remembers that!

    Deliberation was a bit weird, we got given the evidence packet, and there was quite important documents in there that wasn’t brought up in the court. Including a police interview where he admits it. There was on juror who kept arguing the one point that the defense brought, the bullshit. which we just had to argue with him for 30 minutes about. We had requested a recording of something said in court or a transcript, which wasn’t possible of course…

    We made a decision just before lunch, and the usher came in, we said we’d done. And she was like “Oh well it’s lunch now anyway, so you’ll have to wait”

    So we just sat around eating lunch and chatting about stuff.

    I volunteered to be foreman because nobody else would, gave a guilty. And the defendant kicked off, and his family were giving us death stares.

    We had a police escort on the way out.

    It’ honestly a miracle that there’s not more mistrials due to the jury, and jurors getting killed. I actually saw his family in the pub later on so hot footed it out of there.

    On that same one I was on the other side of this recently, being falsely accused and going all the way to court with zero evidence against me. And the whole thing was such an expensive and time expensive farce.

    EDIT: ALSO In the US they do “Jury Selection”, each juror goes in front of the judge and they ask questions. If they think you may in be influenced in any wat you’re dropped.

    The UK was just in the corridor “Heres a list of names, know anyone?”

    Someone on mine did and was swapped out.

    It’s mad how lax it all is

  18. Keeping it vague here..

    The other jurors seemed lost, completely at sea and undecided. Two of the women seemed to have taken a catty dislike to the victim’s wife for no apparent reason, as she barely spoke. One of the blokes was a mouthy old jackass. Another was a creepy weirdo who tagged along uninvited to a pub with me for a dry lunch, where he downed three pints and boasted about his drug taking. And these idiots were about to decide whether someone was guilty or not.

    The attacker was clearly guilty. The judge said if we can’t decide we must acquit. And they simply could not decide. They went on and on and on talking shit. I interjected reminding them what the judge had said and they all looked at each other like lost sheep and sort of nodded in agreement and it was done. Wrapped up. I reckon by then they all just wanted to get home.

    When they announced the verdict, acquit, the accused gave us all a big appreciative grin and a thumbs up. Nobody had been seriously injured but it made us look like fools. Which some of them were.

  19. I’ve done it twice. I was sat around for hours and we didn’t get a single case for the two weeks. Both times everyone pleaded guilty.

  20. A very inefficient process. We spent hours and hours waiting for ‘technical problems’ and other bollock juggling nonsense.

    At all times there were hatchet faced wankers reminding us of the seriousness of our duty and instructing us to respect the authority of the court processes (which appeared to involve a lot of stern looks from some wigwearing git and paper shuffling from assorted other gits).
    Most of the other jurors seemed very happy to sit around, presumably being paid by someone.
    I’m self employed and absolutely hated the experience. I felt that there was no respect for the value of our time at all.

  21. I loved mine but then my work paid me regardless

    Sat around most of the time then got sent home a few times.

    Mine was a lorry driver with immigrants. The whole lot fell apart when each of them said they got off one lorry into his.

    The prosecution was so bad that two of the jury assumed they where the defence

    I tried to get on another case but was deselected. My resting bitch face must have shown my distain for the junkies in court accused of beating up a fellow junkie over drugs.

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