Under Oath

I had jury duty yesterday.

I was the opposite of excited but I also know it’s my civic obligation, so I showed up at the courthouse at eight a.m. sharp. My was hope to not be selected and dismissed before lunch.

No such luck. Fourteen of us in the jury pool were called right out of the gate for a criminal case involving the sexual assault of a minor. As a rape survivor, this was uncomfortable, but I had been instructed to keep my personal history and feelings to myself until my voir dire in front of the judge and attorneys in the courtroom.

When I finally got called in late in the afternoon, the first questions were from the judge, and purely procedural. He established I didn’t know any of the lawyers or witnesses or the defendant in the case, and that I could clear my schedule for the trial dates. Then, the prosecuting attorney approached and asked if I held any particular beliefs about the criminal justice system. Such a sweeping ideological question came as a surprise, but I told him yes and smiled to defuse things. What are those beliefs? he asked, and I wanted to say I’m not a fan, but that was flippant, so I said I believe that justice is uneven. How would you describe what kind of person you are, he asked, and I yammered something about being liberal. Then, he said, forget all about the previous questions and just tell me if you think inequality of justice is based on situations and personalities, or that it is systemic. At last, a concrete question! Systemic, I said, and just like that, I was dismissed.

It had been a long day. Over the course of it, I finished reading a novel (it was short), got acquainted with a few amusing fellow potential jurors, and went outside during break to buy a disturbingly warm yogurt at an overpriced convenience store. I answered honestly, under oath, and the truth indeed set me free- from jury duty, for the next three years.