7 more days.....

As a member of the free world I am hoping that in 7 days time we will have this dude as our new leader. It is serious time for a change and after 8 years, two wars, one financial meltdown, one fraudulent election, millions discriminated against/marginalised and thousands killed me and 5+ billion other people on this planet have officially put the US on notice.

As an American friend of mine commented, "The US have a serious PR problem now and if they get this right all is forgiven. if we get is wrong and its the fall of Rome all over again."

I have faith, not just because of the polls , but in the ability of smart people to say enough is enough.

Duty Bound Part 3

Now for the thrilling conclusion to "Dynasty - the return of the husband stealing whore". Oh wait that was on TV...silly brain.

The deliberation period ended up being one of the most stressful things I have ever been a part of. As the Australian legal system decrees the jury’s decision has to be unanimous there were no majority rules votes, we had to all utterly agree on each point of the law to come to a guilty verdict. We had two counts to rule on and, much to my surprise, the first one was simple. After forty mins we all voted and found him guilty. Imagining myself running from the jury room a free man that day I was wholly unprepared for the fuss the second count would create.

Due to the second count hinging on what the accused’s intent was, we had issues proving what was in his mind at the time of the crime. Some of the jury (me included) saw intent could be inferred from what he did and said. But some of the jury could not infer guilt without solid statement of intent or action. Thus started a three day argument which saw the group fracture, reassemble and then fracture in a final implosion of jury frustration. The entire trial’s evidence was trucked up and down the stairs everyday by our poor old sheriff, someone needs to get him a mule or at least a forklift. We requested the court transcripts and much debate was based around the judge’s last instructions, and what she deemed as being the laws we had to work from. We role played phone calls, drew Venn diagrams, siphoned through tons of paper and talked until we were blue in the face, still we were getting nowhere.

So we decided to send the judge a love note saying we had reached a verdict on count one but were unable to reach a verdict on the second count. We were then ushered into the court room faster than a speeding bullet, the old court Sherriff practically popping a ventricle. Immediately the foreman was asked to stand and deliver the verdict, and no sooner than the word guilty slipped from his lips a mysterious set of stairs behind the accused opened up and out spilled a subterranean army of bailiffs who took him away down into the holding cells. It was the most bizarre and serious sign of the entire trial, and compounded the overall seriousness of this all, that we were not just locked away for the hell of it. We had to make a decision on this man’s actions, and now it was so real, he was guilty and I had been one of twelve people who have indelibly altered his life and his family’s. It was hard not to feel a twinge in my heart, even in the face of all the evidence, it being the first time I had realised he was simply a man who had made a big mistake and not just as a faceless person called ‘The accused’.

But, for us, it was not over, the judge instructed us to return and continue deliberating on the second count. If we could not come to a decision by tomorrow, then we were to let her know. We all left and were so emotionally drained we slumped in our tiny chairs like ragdolls. The next day, we fought and argued, people were starting to crack, shouting, crying etcetera, including myself. I was becoming very angry and about to lose it with the corroded hinge. So by 3pm we decided finally we were never going to agree, and a letter was drafted for the judge and dispatched via huffing Sherriff mail, and ten seconds later we were whooshed into the courtroom as if by waterslide. The accused stood in the dock, surrounded by bailiffs and looking very tired. The judge asked the foreman to stand and asked if we were able to come to a decision based on all the evidence, he said we could not and immediately she thanked us and we were dismissed. It was a blur, five mins later I was collecting my belongings and happily shaking the hands of people who thirty mins ago I wished to slap.

And that was it. I wandered out of Kings Street Court Complex and off into the light, blinking while my phone erupted into a dozen messages, and wondered why I felt a tiny bit sad it was all over. Thinking I was about to suffer the juror’s version of Stockholm Syndrome and marry the judge, the reality of over five weeks of work to catch up on and various relationships to resuscitate snapped me back into this world, soon forgetting about my former institution. It still affects me every now and then though. A dramatic month of amplified emotion and vigorous debate, cathartic and disturbing, I consider it one of the most illuminatingly visceral but valuable experiences of my life.

Duty Bound - Part 2

So on my second trip back to judicial land, we were again unceremoniously shuffled into another cold room where we were told in no uncertain terms that, unless you had a limb falling off or a UN meeting to chair, there was no way you were being excused from Jury duty a second time. The trial slated was also a ‘short’ trial, expected to run for only four weeks so, with that, all excuses were sent spiralling to earth in Hindenburg fashion. Hearing this I crumpled my eloquently pre-crafted employer signed essay into a ball and imagined all the types of office materials I would have to remove from my skull after dropping this bombshell at work. At this point we were stripped of our names, and assigned numbers. While I was trying to remember my new catchy seven digit number, we were informed that the numbers protected our identity and if anyone asked us our real name we were to scream ‘Stranger Danger!’ and run and find the nearest adult. With our new identities in hand, we were moved off to empanelling.

This was not as I expected. It was swift, our numbers were dropped into a large oak box (maybe related to the first judge), and like a Bingo game from hell once our name was called out we walked into the jury box and sat. Once the twelve seats were full, we each stood up one at a time and the barristers had an opportunity to challenge us. I knew about this final chance for dismissal and had decided that day to look particularly redneck. So when my number was inevitably called I, wearing a biker jacket, freshly cropped hair and black jeans, I stomped across the court room with a prize winning scowl. Half expecting the bar table to erupt when it was my turn to stand in the box, all that greeted me was a silence so piercing I could hear the blood throbbing in my ears and the crickets outside. After what seemed liked an eternity I was asked to sit, and that was it. I was there. Being one of the last to come onto the jury box, I looked about at the rest of jurors who all wore the same stunned mullet expression as I. These were faces I was going to get to know very well and yet I had no idea who they were.

After some initial instructions from the judge that I can’t remember due to my mind shrieking with horror, we were asked to leave and go to the jury quarters through a separate door to the left of the box. To say the room was small is an understatement. The pokey staircase twisted up and revealed a claustrophobic room with a large wooden table, twelve rather tightly packed chairs, a tiny kitchenette and a plasma TV - which we later discovered was broken. To make matters worse, there was no natural light only four arch shaped windows made from frosted bullet proof Lucite. The light that was strangled through these windows was powdery and diffused, and to this day I have no idea if it was natural light or from phosphorescent tube lighting sandwiched between the gaps. The feeling it created was like being in a large panted greenhouse, being aware of the world outside but never able to confirm it. When in this room we could only talk about the case once all 12 were present (toilet breaks included) and once we all arrived in the morning, the doors were locked and we were trapped in this unnatural room with 12 strangers, trying to make a decision that would seriously alter another stranger’s life.

We all sat down at the long table and eyeballed each other for a time, then introduced ourselves. Surprisingly we were all quite cavalier about telling each other details about ourselves. The judge had told us that we could ask to be referred to by our numbers if we wished, even though the idea of being called Juror 84-59-006 SCR H was quite charming, I bit the bullet (hopefully not taking one as a result) and joined the party. The jury was a perfect cross section of people including the friendly older Aussie bloke, the chatterbox, the engaged girl, the stoner, the young buck and the know it all. So our life as an empanelled jury began.

We were required to be at the court room my 9.15am sharp, where we were locked into our Lucite box at 10am. After an hour or so a kind hearted semi retired court Sherriff lumbered up the stairs, and spluttered that the court required our presence. Every day our Sherriff ran up the stairs and every day I thought he would drop dead once reaching the top. Walking into the court room as “the Jury” was an awkward feeling, as all eyes are literally on you. You are being eyeballed by the judge, the predatory defence team, the smiling prosecution, court reporters, family and finally the accused. Each group had their own reasons for staring you down, the defence and prosecution tried to read you, whispering and pointing or furiously making notes. But the accused just stared at us, slowly and purposely, looking at everyone as if making a memory facsimile of our entire DNA structure. It was unnerving.

The trial itself went from brain meltingly dull to incredibly absorbing, but mostly we felt as if we were gormless drones due to the detail that was laid out for us. I understood that the case has to be created in detail and in a chronologic order but for some things it was just mind numbing. One ‘expert’ witness was brought in to explain to us about the mysterious world of the home computer. We were presented with a folder of graphical diagrams and pictures, on what a computer was, how one would turn it on, what it looked like and what was this crazy “Internet”. I felt as though my eyeballs were going melt and run down my face from boredom, the ‘expert’ took great care and fifteen mins to let us know a mouse on a computer was not as a result of a rodent problem (no one laughed) but in fact a tool for inputting information. This was not helped by the fact that the ‘experts’ acted out each operation of working a computer. Typing was represented by his fingers wiggling furiously in the air, the computer monitor was represented by a theatrically drawn mid air square, the internet was some kind of floaty cloud thing with a huge open mouth, and inserting a DVD was done in violent jabbing motion with bulging eyes as if he was describing a murder. Initially funny, but after two days this was just plain irritating.

Over the four weeks, we took our pleasures where we could find them. Talking about the teams and discussing possible love affairs within the court “is the judge actually married to the defence?”, we took bets on how long the court would be in session each day for an entire week, we also nicknamed some members of the court. There was ‘Doily’, a court reporter who loved to wear her grandmother’s tablecloths, a junior barrister who was named ‘Green Girl’ due to her rather off putting skin colour, “Madge” the judge’s assistant who was as gruff as a Victorian statue with surprisingly super feminine embellishments like plastic flowers and pink ribbons in her hair and the ‘Court goblins’ who were the defence team assistants that sniggered and smirked at us on a daily basis.

We also talked about run ins with the legal teams outside the court. One girl kept on running into the judge who literally hitched her robes and ran away from her, one guy saw a witness at the pub and I saw the accused in the park, who I ran away hysterically from smashing through the bushes, spilling my latte all down my white tee.

The weeks passed and I became accustomed to my double life as a crime fighter, days locked in a court, evenings spend furiously catching up on work via wireless laptop, nights spent working out and falling asleep before the 9.30 news. I drifted into work when I had ‘days off’ looking like a ghost and feeling rather redundant in the efficacy of my impact on my team’s deadlines. But due to a highly supportive boss and co workers I was able to balance my demands and commitments, without going crazy and slamming my head in the fridge door. I felt strangely disembodied from the world, busier than I have ever been in years, but unable to talk to anyone about my stresses or even about my day. I became the bore at drinks, with friends prodding me for details but with the threat of jail or a pants-peeingly large fine I had to remain tight lipped. So feeling like the most boring interesting person in the world I awaited the end of a trial that was not only wearing down my patience but becoming more a strain at work.

The trial passed the four week point and was still trucking, personalities on the jury became oddly distorted due to the stresses of a daily onslaught of graphical detail and the strain of our lives slowly slipping out of our hands. The friendlies became grumpies, the perky became sobers, the quiet became mutes and the opinionated became utterly dominating and plainly self serving. I, as were others I am sure, was becoming more irritated with one member of the jury who felt everyone wished to hear his forensic detailing and opinions of the court system, or which of his many cars was the most ego-nomical. His voice, like a corroded iron hinge, was quickly making me unhinged, so much so that I had to escape to the toilet three times a day with my powdered coffee for some peace and quiet. In this pressure cooker environment, someone was likely to blow and I starting to understand why one of the Gordon Wood Jurors called the Radio station, they wanted out! Finally after a mumbling and patchy three day closing argument from the prosecution and an angry emotionally charged six hour closing argument from the defence, we were instructed on the law we were to base a decision on and then were sent off up to our shoebox to carry out the most important part of the trial - the deliberation period.

Part 3 coming soon, so is Christmas. No really it actually is. yay!

Duty Bound - Part 1

Hey,
I was asked to write something for the Sydney Morning Herald opinion section on my jury duty expereince. I wrote this, which was 6000 words too long but here it is for you:

When I got called for jury selection, like many people I racked my brain for possible excuses from the experience. Annoyingly I was not pregnant, travelling overseas or in need of an operation. Kicking myself for not going to Bolivia, severing a finger or being a woman, I glumly accepted my fate and found out via a rather Orwellian phone message service the date and time of my required service.

Presenting myself to three gruff sheriffs outside the Dickensian Darlinghurst courts, I was unceremoniously shoved two slips of paper. One form was how you wished to be paid, the other one to fill out if you wanted an “application”. Thinking I was about to go in for a job interview, I was later told by a booming court sheriff that it was an application for my appeal to be excused. With words like ‘application’, ‘appeal’ and ‘excused’, already felt like I was the one on trial, but after entering the cavernous court room one, I realised I was one of 70 citizens, about to serve their community.

After a rather epic speech about how you could be excused if you were a policeman, dentist, miner, mother, butcher, baker, candlestick maker, we were asked to fill in our forms to make an ‘application, explaining our reasons why the judicial machine should let us free. I looked about and pretty much most of the 70 people in the room were hunched over, tongues protruding working on what seemed to be their magnum opus. But what surprised me were the amount of people availing themselves to be on a jury, and they were not the student, old lady, unemployed brigade but a pretty average and cultural biopsy of the community. Anyway, I was wasting precious excuse-making time, so I looked at my form and was horrified that the space available to create the masterpiece was not generous, more space is given to fill out your address on a drivers licence form. So in this 2 cm cube I wrote a poetic description of my job and how great tragedy would befall myself and the company if I was gobbled up in the court system X amount of time. This effort was not helped by the fact it was one of the coldest July mornings of the year and the archaic old court room had no heating expect from an old spluttering fan heater over 20 meters away. My fingers were solid granite and being someone whose writing has been likened to a doctors script the end result was a page of smudged scribblings.

This was not going to go well, I thought as I slid down my oak pew. The sign “jurors in waiting”, officiously branded in the wall behind me, permanent and unmovable, summed up my chances quite aptly I thought.

This case was the Oscar of 2008 trials, the Gordon Wood case, expected to mammoth 16 weeks minimum. As I explain to a sheriff who was as festive as a pit-bull in a party hat, my boss would rather run through Circular Quay in a flaming grass skirt than let my clients go to seed over 4 months. The sheriff growled that my excuse was not good enough and that “anyone could use that excuse”. I was quite taken aback as I thought career requirements would be as serious as studies and well timed breeding. Lady pit-bull then told me that I would have to talk with the judge to be let free. This to my horror would happen two hours later in open court. We were frog marched into the court room and the entire court was set up and chomping at the bit to get moving - barristers, reporters, court assistants and a rather stoic and grand looking judge who looked like he had been whittled from a thousand year old piece of oak.

Lining up for our private audience with the judge, perky words like ‘empanelled’, ‘sequester’, ‘unemployment’ and ‘destitute’ whirled in my head with cyclonic fervour. I snapped to attention when I saw the Judge beckoning me over with a finger so long and bony that it must have creaked like a wooden box lid when moved. Up close he took on an even more Tolkien like severity, this was not helped by the fact he was a little over 3 feet higher than my head (I am 6’3) in his seat. The similarities between this and Oliver and the slop server were not lost on me. The judge then spoke in an alarmingly soft and kind voice “what is your application” he asked. I managed to ramble coherently about work, 16 weeks, elves and a grand quest to not be on the bread line by December. He smiled kindly, half expecting him to flick a large lever and I would tumble into a pit lined with spikes. But he whispered ‘you are excused’.

But that, however, was not it. I was promptly told by Ms Pit-bull that I was required back in two weeks for another trial.

Oooh gripping, stay turned for next week's part 2, where I lose my marbles.