Adventures in Jury Selection

Far too little is asked of me in return for being an American. Sure, I could join the military, work for the government or stop using complicated accounting tricks to avoid taxes, but I’m the kind of guy who prefers to be forced. So I get excited whenever I get a jury-duty letter. Not only is it an opportunity to do my part for a legal system I believe in, but also, after a career of writing columns, it would be nice to finally have my opinion matter.

Yet I’ve never even gotten close to making it onto a jury. A few weeks ago, I once again sat in an L.A. criminal-court building all day, hoping to be assigned to a trial. Then, just an hour away from being once again sent home, I heard my name called. I ran down the hall like it was The Price Is Right.

The first thing the Honorable Craig Richman told me and my hundred competitors was that our trial was going to take a little longer than average, since he likes to make it fun. Judge Richman, I could tell, really knew how to read a room. He asked Deputy Velasco, who is short, to stand up even though he already was standing; he told us not to leave our belongings behind since this was a criminal court, which meant there were criminals around. It was the material of a man who had a legally captive audience.

The next day, I was randomly labeled juror No. 5 and proudly took my seat in the jury box. Then Judge Richman asked if anyone had a reason they could not serve on this jury. People had incredibly elaborate excuses about how busy they were with their jobs or their kids, and for some reason, Judge Richman never said, “Oh, you’re right, that does sound far more important than figuring out if someone tried to kill another person.”

Judge Richman then asked us each if we were able to avoid making assumptions about the defendant, who was also in the room, based on the enormous tattoo covering his face. I told him I certainly could. But by the 20th time he asked a potential juror, I started to wonder if, compared with the non–face tattooed, the face tattooed are more likely to make poor decisions. After all, these are people who walked into a tattoo parlor and said, “I think this design will go well with my face.”

Next, we were asked our occupation, our family members’ occupations, if we were tight with any cops and if anyone close to us had ever perpetrated or suffered from a violent crime. I was shocked to find out that a quarter of my fellow potential jurors had experienced horrifying violence: a husband murdered, an ex-husband in prison for murder, a sister killed by a gang member, a woman whose suburban home was broken into and had knives left on her bed as a warning. One guy had so much drama in his life that an hour after he was asked, he raised his hand to tell the judge he’d forgotten to mention that his brother got arrested for having marijuana in his car, did three years in a Texas jail and got deported on the day of his release. When a man stepped on my sunglasses as we left for lunch break, I didn’t get angry at him, not because his brother and two cousins had been murdered but because he knew that I knew that.

I made it to Day Three without a single question being fired at me by either attorney. With only half the room remaining, I was feeling great about my chances, when, out of nowhere, I was sent home by the prosecutor. Which verified all my fears: I am too soft, too weak and too liberal to convict even a potential murderer. I stood up and yelled, “What did I do? I was well behaved!” I left the courtroom and mimed “I’ll call you” to the prosecutor.

The prosecutor wouldn’t talk to me, possibly because my miming was more suggestive than I intended. So I called Philip K. Anthony, CEO of DecisionQuest, a national trial-consulting firm. He told me that because I live in Holly-wood and work in the media, I am indeed too soft, weak and liberal to ever get picked for a criminal case, though he thought I might be good for other cases. “If you got called on an intellectual-property case, both sides could potentially say, ‘We need people who can analyze data and be precise. This guy is perfect,'” Anthony said. In other words, I’m such a nerd that I can judge only other nerds.

Tossing me didn’t help just the prosecution but also justice itself. Because while a jury that included a few educated English speakers might sound great, Anthony told me, it’s more important to have a homogeneous jury that will debate instead of being led by one person’s opinion. That’s why I got thrown out at the same time as four other potential jurors with white collar jobs. Who, I must admit, were not a jury of peers for the face tattooed. Or people who don’t watch Mad Men.

I don’t know what the jury decided, but I’m sure they made a better decision than I would have. Because I’m not jury material. Or Army material. Or government material. They really should raise my taxes.