Jury Duty - How many times?

I've been called three times under the "new" New York City system. Prior to about 1996, just about anyone could get out of jury duty. Any doctor, lawyer or "your honor, my business will suffer irreparable harm by my absence'' could walk. Now everybody must serve, no excuses, or hardly any. (See Roberta above.)
I didn't mind but my boss was nearly apoplectic every time. He was an old New Yorker and didn't believe you couldn't weasel out of it. When HE got called he tried to get his doctor to send a note saying that he couldn't sit for more than an hour. The judge didn't buy it. What he finally did was, during a break, he went up to one of the defense attorneys and told him what a good job he thought he was doing. ..........
yeah.
Mis-trial.
Judge very unhappy. THISCLOSE to being throw in the slammer for contempt, but the guy was a very good liar. "Oh, gosh, your honor, I never thought I was doing anything wrong."
==
Anyway, he always thought anyone who couldn't get out of jury duty wasn't trying hard enough to get out of jury duty.
He gave me a very hard time about it.

But he was right.
For me, it was interesting (and boring) and

Joe(about five days away from the lying bastard)Nation

I have been called to jury duty several times, but actually sat as a jurist twice, once because some anti abortion parents chained their little kid to a clinic, causing the authorities to break the jaws of life trying to cut the chain. I told them I was predjudiced against the defendants, but they sat me anyway. Second time was for almost a week, in a discrimination case filed by a woman police officer. On April 20th this year, I am called to serve once again.

Holy Cow....that took some serious internal fortitude.

I just don't know of anyone here that has gotten called that many times.

I will do what I have to. I will let them know I have kidlets that have an end of the year program that next week and that the week I have been called is going to be tough if I actually get seated on a jury. If I don't get excused I will just deal

I will also bring up my extensive health insurance background and that my brother in law is a local policeman.

See? They only have so many jurors they can strike right? I guess you were the lesser of other evils for them

I think it comes in waves. I was selected my first time when I was in college " it was when we had to serve a month (now it is one day/one trial). Since it was a month requirement, they allowed you to defer it. I deferred it to the summer and since I was a student, they actually paid me per day. It wasn’t much, but being a poor student anything helped. And it was an incredible learning opportunity " in that month I served on an accident case, a rape case and the biggie " a murder case. I actually got paid a bit more for the murder case.

After that, it seemed my number was called annually " obviously I didn’t have to serve again 3 years later. But then it was 1 trial/1 day. I was called in " my number pulled for a drug trial, but for some reason they didn’t like me and I was let go. After that it was years and years until I was called again to serve.

So maybe this is just your “lucky” time.

With kids, can’t you defer it or see if you can change to a later date? With most one day/one trial, it can be difficult. I know when I was called a couple of years ago, I was able to move it to closer location within my county. They wanted me to go some where that would have been an hour or less with traffic " I asked a change of venue because of child care duties (being able to pick or drop off my children on time) " so they moved me to a court a mile from my house.

Doesn't the address informations come from the DMV? I think if you got
a ticket in one year, you won't receive a summons for jury duty for another two years following the ticket year. At least that's how I tracked my jury duty letters.

I was good for a number of years (meaning without speeding ticket) and got
quite a few jury duty summons. As fate happens to come along, I got another
speeding ticket recently

This is no advise though mismi, don't go out speeding now!

I was told the jury list comes from the census. But does anyone know for sure?

Hm, the last census was 10 years ago and people move around quite a bit,
I am not sure. I'll ask the oracle google...

Ah it is the DMV

http://www.jud.ct.gov/jury/faq.htm#selected

Odd, my mom doesn't have a drivers' liscence (and never had one) - I wonder how she got called? She has been called to jury duty before.

Ah, you are in CT and there are other sources: Department of Motor Vehicles, Department of Revenue Services, Department of Labor and the Registrars of Voters for the state’s 169 towns.

Mass is much more secretive on how they select jurors - but they must get college lists of students because the prespective juror list includes: students from other states who are attending college here (inhabitants), and students who reside within Massachusetts, but attend school elsewhere (residents).

This is how Mass selects it lists: "Prospective jurors are selected at random from the residents lists supplied to the Office of Jury Commissioner (OJC) each year by each of the 351 cities and towns within Massachusetts." Pretty vague.

And the FAQ section is "under construction"

I was never called when I lived in NY. The first year after I moved to Florida I was called. Apparently, this woman had known that her boyfriend was a wanted criminal, but attempted to prevent the cops from catching him.

Strange thing was that the prosecutor was awful, and her lawyer was pretty good. The facts were the facts, though.

She was found guilty. I found out later that the charge against her boyfriend had been dropped, but she was guilty anyway.

It was an interesting experience, and the last in over 15 years.

It differs from state to state. I think you're right as far as Massachusetts goes. But, apparently, in California they use DVM records, not census figures.

Interesting! I didn't know that states differ in selecting jurors. I wonder if
they have a study somewhere where it tells us how the different selection
processes actually impact the outcome of a trial.

I do think it would make a difference, if one states selection list is from a
college and another one is from the DMV, or the retirement community 80 years and up, or....

Aren't there any federal guidelines the states have to oblige by.

They can also use voter roles to select jurors.

Where I live:

They use the lists of registered voters, lists of holders of drivers’ licenses or ID’s issued by the Division of Motor Vehicles, lists of state tax filers, and recipients of unemployment insurance or family assistance, to randomly select people for jury duty.

You can request to be excused based on financial or medical hardship, but you have to back it up with documentation. You can also request a postponement once, but you must give an alternate date, which falls within 2-6 months of your jury notice, when you will be available to serve.

If you do report for state jury duty, you are not eligible to serve again for six years. If you served for 10 days or more, you are not eligible to serve again for 8 years.

If you were called for state jury service, you can still be called for federal jury service after a period that varies between 2-4 years.

The last time I was called for state jury duty, I was on telephone standby for about 2 days. So, I didn't have to show up at the courthouse, but I did have to call in at a certain time each day to find out if I was required to appear. On the 2nd day, I was told to show up. I think that standby status can go on for 5 days, and if you don't have to physically appear by then, you are excused, but you are considered to have fulfilled your jury service. Using the telephone standby method probably does cut down on the days you spend just sitting in the courthouse waiting because they can have blocks of potential jurors show up as they need them.

I was called ~3 times when I lived in California, and my husband was once or twice. We lived there for three years. I've never been called in any other state (I've lived in four others).

Got out of all three calls in CA though, being deaf is a great excuse, unfortunately. They don't want to pay for interpreters.

I've been called two times in a year. There was this time when I got called 4 times a year.

I got it deferred until next year. Too much going on this time of year with three little boys. I just called them and told them what all was happening. They were so nice about it.

Very thankful.