Can you get out of doing jury service?

[Brisel]

I've never done it. I don't understand why it takes the jurors so long to come to a decision. When they enter the jury room for the first time, they elect a foreman, they have heard all the evidence and they have a show of hands. I suppose that the problem comes with the people who can't make up their minds.

I don't have personal experience of jury duty, but Mrs B has done it twice.

IMO most jurors just want to be fair. In the less clear cases there is a lot of debate in the jury room, especially when there is a difference of opinion and one person will try and gather support for their positions. Mrs B had 3 short cases the first time - all drunken fights. The more recent stint was more noteworthy. 1st cases was a fight between night club bouncers & some Polish lads. Not guilty - the judge said it was a waste of time bringing ABH charges when at the most it was Affray. The second case was longer & was about a guy who lost an eye in a knife attack outside another nightclub. There was enough doubt over the evidence for not guilty until some of the jurors wanted to see the CCTV footage again. What they saw was far longer than what had been shown in court & brought a lot of new evidence to the case that was highly damning to the defendants. In addition to this, one of the policemen involved in the case was trying to strike up conversation with a juror outside the court which is highly inappropriate. Verdict - instant mistrial and a future retrial. The CPS and Police were either incompetent or something more sinister. Not good value for taxpayers' money. My wife was kept busy for the full 2 weeks. Every case was alcohol related in some way.

 

[som farmer]

one of the other cases we 'dealt' with, was the theft of a trailor, very obviously guilty, but we all agreed police, and cps, had made such bolls up of the evidence, that we said not guilty, one has to decide on the evidence put before us, and it was an easy decision, 15 minutes.

 

[Handy Andy]

I got out of it, but would quite like to have done it. They called me up for middle of August a few years back so it was impossible. They are very understanding if you explain your reasons for not being able to do it clearly.