How To Get Out Of Jury Duty?

In this episode of Summary Judgment, Josh and Aaron discuss the importance of the jury in our legal system and why you SHOULDN'T try to get out or jury duty.

 FVF Law is a well-credentialed, overwhelmingly 5-star reviewed personal injury law firm in Austin, TX. FVF strives to be the educational resource for the injured, available to guide those with questions about what comes next. It is FVF’s mission to ensure clients are prioritized and informed throughout the injury claim process, and to secure the best possible outcome. Josh Fogelman and Aaron Von Flatern founded FVF Law to offer a different kind of injury law firm, and a dignified alternative in the marketplace. They hope to show injured Texans that consulting a lawyer after an injury is a natural, and responsible thing to do.

Transcript

0:00:00.0 Aaron: Hey, Josh.

0:00:00.3 Josh: Hey, Aaron.

0:00:01.1 Aaron: What's the meanest thing you've heard said about juries? 

0:00:08.3 Josh: The meanest thing I've ever heard said about juries? I don't know that I can really think of anything ever mean said about juries.

0:00:17.8 Aaron: You've never heard someone say, oh, that's like the 12 dumbest people in the county.

0:00:21.2 Josh: Oh no.

0:00:22.2 Aaron: Or those are the 12 people that were too dumb to get outta jury duty.

0:00:24.9 Josh: Oh no. People say those kinds of things? 

0:00:26.9 Aaron: It's a mean world out there.

0:00:30.9 Josh: Because people wanna get out of jury duty because they don't wanna do the job, because it's extraordinarily disruptive to their lives. And they get paid a very limited amount of money, and oftentimes walk out of the courthouse and they've got tickets on their car, then they gotta go through the process of getting the parking ticket. There's a lot of reasons to be fearful. So, Aaron, how do people get out of jury duty? 

0:01:01.0 Aaron: We always tell people, those who talk walk, conversely, if you don't talk during the jury selection process, you're gonna end up on the jury. So those who talk walk, what do I mean by that? You probably have an idea.

0:01:14.2 Josh: Yeah. It means when you're going through the jury, select... And by the way, this podcast, to be clear, is why you shouldn't try to get out of jury duty.

0:01:24.6 Aaron: Don't get outta jury duty. It's great.

0:01:25.4 Josh: Don't get outta jury. We'll talk about why in a moment. But those who talk walk, so the jury duty process is about trying to find a group of people who can fairly and impartially follow the instructions of the court, listen to the evidence, and answer the jury charge in a way that the court instructs. When you start asking people questions about their biases and their lives, you're asking them to reveal things about themselves that might ultimately demonstrate them to not be qualified to serve on a jury in that particular instance. And you develop good reasons oftentimes about why that juror should be excused from that trial because it's not fair to either side. On the other hand, when you have people who don't talk, both sides of the case, the plaintiff's side and the defense side don't really know what to make of that person, and that can be kind of a crapshoot for the juror. So that's not really advisable.

0:02:47.4 Aaron: So let's be clear that a lot of people think, well, the reason I'm staying silent is because I'm an honest person, and I'm not gonna make up a bias that I don't have. I'm not gonna raise my hand and say I dislike police, or I dislike plaintiffs, or I think insurance companies are evil. So I'm just gonna stay silent. What people don't know is that bias is not the only reason you get kicked off of juries. Each side has what we call peremptory strikes. As long as you're not striking them for race or gender, you can strike someone just because you don't get a good feeling from them for any reason that you can articulate, and you do have to sometimes be able to articulate it.

0:03:31.5 Josh: Sure.

0:03:34.2 Aaron: But that means that if you open your mouth and just say something like, "I like the color orange." Guarantee there's gonna be someone who disagrees with that. And one of the lawyers hates the color orange, all of a sudden you're not on the jury. So, in other words, just by talking, you're giving someone something to form an opinion on, and the chances go up that they will not want you on their jury and we'll kick you off. You know? 

0:04:03.6 Josh: But here's what we constantly tell prospective jurors when we are in trial, picking a jury, and even what we just tell people when we're talking about the jury trial process at a cocktail party, a dinner party. Serving as a juror can be incredibly rewarding. It can be incredibly interesting. It can be incredibly fulfilling, and it is one of the absolute most fundamentally important parts of the American legal system. So even though it can be inconvenient, even though it can be disruptive, and even though you don't get fairly compensated for the amount of time you oftentimes have to spend in the courtroom away from work, what you're contributing to the system as a whole is invaluable.

0:05:08.6 Aaron: Yeah. We outsource so much of our own government, right? Like, I think we're all a little disconnected from our senators and our legislatures at state level and the president. Some of us are connected to city council people that we might know personally, maybe they live around the corner from us getting a little more personal there. But there is something very primal about sitting on a tribunal, sitting with a group of the community members who are known to be upstanding enough citizens. I'm not gonna say everyone's perfect, but the jurors have to be basically qualified to sit there. They've proven that they're not bias, they're of age, they're not convicted of felonies or whatever it is. And so they're sitting there, they're qualified and just like cave people did, thousands and thousands of years ago, they're sitting and hearing all the facts, hearing all the evidence, getting firsthand accounts in order to make a fair decision, not just for the people that are involved, but a decision that's fair to the standards of the community and our culture.

0:06:17.9 Aaron: And so this is a direct form of government, and I've always said it's the last form of government that's of by and for the people. And it is transcendent. If you participate in it, you walk away a little taller. It's just a really cool experience. And most jurors come back to us and tell us that they have really busy lives, that they've got their own careers. They couldn't believe they threw the jury card because they were gonna cost them money. They had to make arrangements with their brother-in-law to watch the kids. They were super frustrated coming into it, but they walk out of it feeling like a citizen.

0:06:52.8 Josh: That's right.

0:06:53.9 Aaron: And it's a great feeling.

0:06:54.0 Josh: That's the absolute, one of the most critical ways that you can actually participate in the decision-making of the government. We talk to jurors at trial, and we let them know that they represent the conscience of the community. So think about that for a minute. You're gonna have a group of people, small group of people, depending on whether you're in county court or district court, a small group of people who oftentimes are tasked with enormous decision-making, that can have a ripple effect throughout their community. The decisions that they make, tell the community what is and is not acceptable behavior, what people can and cannot do, and get away with in our community. And that's an incredibly, incredibly empowering position to be in as an individual citizen when that voice actually carries the weight of the law, which is one of the most beautiful parts of our judicial system and our government as a whole, frankly.

0:08:00.1 Josh: And one of the things that to your point, that jurors, when they get out of service, they've seen how the sausage is made. They have been behind the scenes, and I think it opens their eyes to the fact that if they ever find themselves in a dispute that can't get resolved, that they know that the system is there and that while it's not a perfect system, that the system can really work for them and give them a voice when in many other places in the world, they would literally have none. So yes, while there might be tactics that can get you out of jury service, I think this isn't a responsibility and really an honor that people should take extraordinarily seriously before they try to execute on one of those tactics, because their voice in the room can be a huge difference maker in how, what kind of behavior will be tolerated in our community and they can really, really make a difference.

0:09:19.8 Aaron: So, don't get out of jury duty.

0:09:19.9 Josh: Don't get outta jury duty.

0:09:21.1 Aaron: And thank you 12 coolest people in the county.

0:09:29.4 Josh: Thanks for listening.