12 MAY 2009 : TUESDAY
I had slept downstairs so that I could set an alarm and repeatedly hit snooze without Amanda getting annoyed. As it turned out, she heard the alarms anyway, but was too sleepy to come downstairs and berate me. I decided to not wear my usual ratty hiking boots and ripped jeans since justice is serious business.
I caught a 7 bus downtown and walked up to the municipal courthouse. I had been there before, so I knew the searching drill on entrance and where everything was. I checked in, got my free bus passes, and looked for a place to wait and to plug in my notebook computer. A bit of research earlier told me that plugs were a scare resource, and they were, but I scored a seat by the two phones.
It turned out that most people did not really dress up at all. The people who did looked like people who worked downtown and dressed up everyday anyway.
The jury assembly room is on the top floor and had a very nice view of downtown Seattle and Elliot Bay and had the weather been clearer one could see Mt. Rainier to the southeast and the Olympics to the west. Unfortunately, I did not bring my camera. There was a really big room with many chairs, tables, and a couple of large TVs. There were also magazines, books, puzzles, and games. Adjacent to the big room was a so-called “quiet” room that also contained a few computer stations. There was a room with vending machines, coffee, tea, a refrigerator, a microwave, and lots of posters for various plays, shows, and concerts for some reason. And bathrooms. And a super-secret elevator controlled only by the baliffs to get down to the courtroom levels.
There was a lot of art on the walls. One piece, which I was sitting under, was a big metal box with a lot of elevator buttons arranged in a grid. One could press the buttons to turn them on and off, and every four seconds or so the lights would change according to the rules of Conway’s game of life. It was pretty cool, really.
As I did get there early, I took advantage of their wireless connection, which was alright, but a bit erratic. It seemed like most people had problems getting there on time. Eventually, though, we all were present, and they gave a little presentation. A judge came in and welcomed us, and then they showed a video on the whole courtroom process. A few people fell asleep, which did not bode well for them later. Then one of the workers filled us in on more details like the typical court schedule (9am-4:30pm or later), lunch (typically noon – 1:30pm), and the like. As other jury situations, everything is in “hurry up and wait” mode… waiting to get called for a jury, waiting for the parties to agree on stuff, waiting for judges to rule on things, etc. etc..
I was at the Seatle Municipal Court, and they handled stuff like minor drug cases, domestic violence, traffic stuff, civil cases, and the like. Mostly things that did not take more than one or two days, although there are exceptions. I guess the more major issues usually go to the King County Court. I did find out that jury service is completely random and there is no maximum frequency that one could serve. That is, I could get chosen again for jury duty in another month, say, or get chosen for jury duty by King County. Unlike New York where doing jury duty would let you off the hook anywhere in NY for two or three years if I recall.
I spent the morning fiddling around with Django and looking for future employment. Since I was sitting next to the landlines, I had the questionable fortune of hearing someone plot out their strategy for laying off a lot of people at their workplace. Didn’t this guy have a cell phone?
As it turned out, only one group of people (they call sixteen at a time) was called before lunchtime, and I was not among them. The break for lunch was a long time, but I decided to stay and save the $$$. I had brought some granola bars anyway. The vast majority of people left, though, and I did regret not walking about downtown.
In the afternoon a few more groups were called, but again I was not chosen. Eventually one of the court workers came out and said that they were set for juries for the rest of the week, and the rest of us were free to go; our jury service was considered complete after only one day. Woot. I easily made it back in time to pick up Lonan Kai from school.
I did want to dispense some justice, though. Maybe next time.