Jury Duty 3X in five years!

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the5thelement

the5thelement

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Keep getting summons for Jury duty since moving to CA!! And it costs money if you are in private practice , not to mention patient inconvenience.
The first time round, I requested to be excused as my schedules were packed in the already understaffed county clinic, but it was
swiftly denied by the judge!
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the5thelement said:
Keep getting summons for Jury duty since moving to CA!! And it costs money if you are in private practice , not to mention patient inconvenience.
The first time round, I requested to be excused as my schedules were packed in the already understaffed county clinic, but it was
swiftly denied by the judge!
Click to expand...
When they're screening you for it, just mention that you believe that the members of the jury have the right to judge the law (itself) in addition to the evidence (jury nullification). If you actually believe in that (in principle), of course.
 
I have a feeling I wish to avoid that level of jury duty.

But the above advice is comforting.
 
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Fan_of_Meehl said:
When they're screening you for it, just mention that you believe that the members of the jury have the right to judge the law (itself) in addition to the evidence (jury nullification). If you actually believe in that (in principle), of course.
Click to expand...

I always just hope they're summoning me for a medical malpractice case...as soon as they hear you're a doctor they can't get you out of there fast enough. At least that's what happened last time 😆
 
Fan_of_Meehl said:
When they're screening you for it, just mention that you believe that the members of the jury have the right to judge the law (itself) in addition to the evidence (jury nullification). If you actually believe in that (in principle), of course.
Click to expand...
Fully informed jury. I used that once, with success!
 
When you do not appear for jury duty, you will be sent a postcard stating you failed to appear. ... You will automatically be assigned a new date for jury duty if you do not respond. Further failure to appear could result in punishment by fine, incarceration or both. Fines can start at $250 with a maximum of $1500
 
Stagg737 said:
Was always curious, what happens if you just don't show up?
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Probably depends a lot on the local municipality and such. However, I recall a few years ago mixing up the little colored jury duty summons card into a pile of junk mail and not getting around to it for a couple of months. Was kind of freaking out but I just called the number, told the clerk what happened, and they said they'd put me on the next round. Didn't get in trouble.
 
Just show up and state that you are a racist...you will then be let go
 
Here we can get excused if running our own business/financial hardship reasons, and in some states there are exemptions for medical practitioners. It's also likely that as a psychiatrist we'd fit a stereotype of being too biased in favour of victims and get vetoed by defence lawyers.

The other approach which I know one of my colleagues has done, is to state that they have many patients with PTSD who are victims of crime, believe current punishments for criminals are too lenient and would be very happy to be on a jury! I don't think they were asked again.
 
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In my case, the defendant was accused of gruesome child molestation. They must have dismissed a hundred potential jurors before they got to me. I simply stated that it was very difficult for me to be impartial as I saw victims suffering from PTSD nearly every day.
 
I get the frustration, and the people relying on you. BUT I would caution that this vocal avoidance of civic duty can come across negatively (e.g., the other side of this argument is the guy whose income is well above the area median can afford to lose some money, which is not as true for the guy who is making poverty wages.)
 
PsyDr said:
I get the frustration, and the people relying on you. BUT I would caution that this vocal avoidance of civic duty can come across negatively (e.g., the other side of this argument is the guy whose income is well above the area median can afford to lose some money, which is not as true for the guy who is making poverty wages.)
Click to expand...
What does this mean
 
I used to live in NJ. A new law was made in the 80s where it forbid doctors from using that profession as an excuse to being a juror as is allowed in most states. I don't know WTF the legislators were thinking. Making docs the new scapegoat and they were going to stick it to us? Someone decided to not blame the (insert here: liberals, conservatives, Blacks, Jews, Gays, gun-owners,...), and go for doctors instead. Many doctors, even ones running an ICU were now forced to do jury duty without any regard of the repercussions this would have. My dad was a surgeon then and told me that his colleagues were forced to do jury duty despite that no one could cover for them and in positions, like an ICU where lack of coverage would be horrendous. Some of the politicians endorsing it even made it out like doctors were getting out of paying their rightful share to society-again as if we were the evil (insert group here) that were also screwing them.

Literally within days of the law being passed and enacted newspaper headlines were bringing up cases of patients who were screwed and that law was dropped literally just weeks after it was put in action. People bombarded the state government asking WTF was going on and to fix it immediately. I can't remember a time when a law was passed and literally within weeks it's dumped except for that one.

In my current state-Missouri, if a doctor is asked to do jury duty you can just write a letter stating you're a physician, put a copy of your license in and then they excuse you.
 
robellis said:
What does this mean
Click to expand...

Imagine being in a jury pool. You're watching the attorneys pick the jurors. The potential juror in front of you gets called up to see if he should be sleected or excused. they question him. He says he makes about $1.6 million/yr. When they ask if he has any hardships, he says, "I'll lose income if I'm not in the office.".

Would you have any sympathy for his lost income? Or would that excuse make you think "what a prat"? The owner of the Mets learned that trying such excuses, instead of invoking sympathy, made people really mad, when he said he was "just trying to make a living".

An annual income of 1.6MM is about 6X the average annual income of a psychiatrist. And the average psychiatrist makes about 6X the average individual income in the USA.

So maybe one should remember the audience when trying to invoke sympathy about lost earnings,
 
Have any psychiatrists actually been placed on a jury after saying they were a psychiatrist?
 
PsyDr said:
Imagine being in a jury pool. You're watching the attorneys pick the jurors. The potential juror in front of you gets called up to see if he should be sleected or excused. they question him. He says he makes about $1.6 million/yr. When they ask if he has any hardships, he says, "I'll lose income if I'm not in the office.".

Would you have any sympathy for his lost income? Or would that excuse make you think "what a prat"? The owner of the Mets learned that trying such excuses, instead of invoking sympathy, made people really mad, when he said he was "just trying to make a living".

An annual income of 1.6MM is about 6X the average annual income of a psychiatrist. And the average psychiatrist makes about 6X the average individual income in the USA.

So maybe one should remember the audience when trying to invoke sympathy about lost earnings,
Click to expand...
Sure, I don't think the "lost income" argument is gonna fly for a judge (or the jurors). That's literally 50% of the people's reason they don't want to be in jury duty anyway.

I think having to reschedule 70+ patients because you were out for a week for jury duty is a more compelling argument. Or rescheduling those new intakes who waiting a month for that appointment. We aren't working a desk at Apple or working in a warehouse at Amazon where someone else can just do whatever you do for a week or you can just leave your team for a week. If I didn't have to shaft a bunch of patients, sure no problem, I don't mind that much being on jury duty, could even be kind of interesting.
 
clausewitz2 said:
TIL being called for jury duty means suddenly you become British.

As for me I honestly state that I used to work as a legal assistant. They invite me to piss off right quick.
Click to expand...

Maybe it’s an affectation, maybe there’s another reason for some conversational oddities and popular cultural ignorance.
 
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Liquid8 said:
Here we can get excused if running our own business/financial hardship reasons, and in some states there are exemptions for medical practitioners. It's also likely that as a psychiatrist we'd fit a stereotype of being too biased in favour of victims and get vetoed by defence lawyers.

The other approach which I know one of my colleagues has done, is to state that they have many patients with PTSD who are victims of crime, believe current punishments for criminals are too lenient and would be very happy to be on a jury! I don't think they were asked again.
Click to expand...

Ha I was thinking going the other way. I feel like like psychiatry has a reputation for being super liberal(Myself included), and in my training so far I see a lot of substance use disorders and people who have been put through the legal system as a result, without any real benefit to their lives or society(imo) so I always figured I would play that up and get off that way.
 
comp1 said:
Have any psychiatrists actually been placed on a jury after saying they were a psychiatrist?
Click to expand...

As a psychologist, my occupation didn't get me dismissed or seem to have much impact on the attorneys' decisions during voir dire. I ended up not getting on the jury, but I suspect it was just because there were enough people ahead of me that they wanted on there more. A psychologist colleague did make it onto a jury about a year before that, but I don't remember the nature of the case. Not sure if any of the psychiatrists I work with have been called to jury duty recently.
 
I generally just make it clear that I'm morally opposed to a lot of laws and couldn't ethically offer a guilty verdict if I believe the underlying law is unjust and they tend to let me go
 
calvnandhobbs68 said:
I think having to reschedule 70+ patients because you were out for a week for jury duty is a more compelling argument. Or rescheduling those new intakes who waiting a month for that appointment
Click to expand...

My earliest intake is early June so try 3 months if I were called.
 
Mad Jack said:
I generally just make it clear that I'm morally opposed to a lot of laws and couldn't ethically offer a guilty verdict if I believe the underlying law is unjust and they tend to let me go
Click to expand...
Might be a good reason to be selected for a jury. Can't use jury nullification if jurors who know what that is aren't on the jury.
 
I was on a medical malpractice case the summer before I started med school. I actually enjoyed the entire process, though I didn't have many obligations that made it difficult with my schedule to take the time off. I would hope that everyone gets to take part in the judicial process at least once in their lives
 
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