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silveradeptFor the last few weeks, I've been experiencing firsthand the process of jury selection, empanelment, and trial, as a juror who was selected to hear a case and render a verdict. Now that it's finished, I thought it might be worth documenting for anyone else who is curious.
The process, in the United States, starts by making random selections from a database composed of persons who have driver licenses, identity cards, voter registrations, or other documents that indicate they are of age to serve as jurors in a case. A "speedy and public" jury trial is guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States in all cases where a jury trial is warranted or guaranteed. Which often means a lot of trials, and subsequently, a lot of persons will be called for jury service over the course of any given calendar year, for trials that can be at any level of jurisdiction of the court. Generally, courts attempt to have the trial in the smallest court level that has appropriate jurisdiction for the offenses charged against the defendant (or of the complaint made by one party against the other), so while it is rare that a person may be called for jury service at the federal jurisdiction level, it is not rare that a person will be called for jury service.
Once the list of persons to be called for service has been finalized, those persons are sent a summons for jury service. This initial summons is for a date in the future where the person will be expected to report to the courthouse and be available for the court as a potential juror. Persons receiving a summons may respond by accepting the summons and saying they will report for service on the date indicated, or they can ask the court to excuse them from the service for reasons indicating hardship, either for the person themselves or from their employer, that jury service would cause. The first time I received a jury summons, I was a university student several counties away, and requested to be excused from service based on the disruption to my studies and the length of travel that would be required for me to properly attend jury service. That request was granted. This time around, I checked with my employer, and my employer found no reason to ask for me to be excused. So, having sent my response in to the court, the first part of the process was complete.
I received an identifying badge that had a number and barcode on it, with instructions to call a telephone line or check a website to see if their group of persons have been called to report to the correct courthouse's jury administration room and scan that badge's barcode in to indicate that I had reported as directed. (Failure to report for jury service is a misdemeanor offense, we are told.) My group was called on the first potential day for service, so I went in. After enough of the people reported in, the jury administration staff played for us two videos, one that walked us through the process of jury service and its importance in civil society, and a second video about implicit biases and the need to avoid allowing them to influence decisions in cases. After this, the jury administrator also mentioned certain situations where a person would be excluded from jury service and other situations where the jury administration staff wants to have a conversation with a person to see whether they would also be excluded.
After this, the waiting begins. On any given day, there may be cases before the court that request a number of jurors, called a panel, to appear before the magistrate, the lawyers / counselors, and the parties to the case and answer questions. The number of jurors requested for a panel varies, depending on the jurisdiction of the court and the seriousness of the offense committed. On the first day, several panels were requested, but I was not on any of them. Once all of the panels for the day had been decided, persons who were not on a panel of jurors were released for the day with instructions to call the same telephone line and/or consult the website for instructions about whether they would be required to report back the next day for further waiting. (There were lunch breaks and other such things.) Potential jurors are still referred to by group numbers in this cycle.
For some significant number of persons called, this will be the sum total of their jury service. They will report when requested, wait to see if they will be empaneled, will not be empaneled, and at the end of the time specified for their service, they will be dismissed with the thanks of the court and the pittance they are paid for their jury service. Many persons called to jury service desire this outcome, as it is the least disruption their lives and workplaces will have for performing their civic duty.
Selection of a panel of jurors is, to the best of my knowledge, random from the list of persons who have reported in that day for service. Persons so designated are attached to a specific case before the court and identified with a number. From this point forward, the person attached to the case is referred to solely by their number. In the jury administration space where I have been, each case that has requested a panel has a color or style badge associated with it, and all persons put on the panel for that jury will be wearing a badge of that color or style with their number on it. Once a person has been attached to a case on a jury panel, they are no longer following the directions for unattached persons, but are instead following the directions of the court, usually in the form of the judicial assistant assigned to the courtroom. Attached jurors then begin a process known as voir dire.
The process of voir dire involves the lawyers for each side of the case and the court (in the form of the magistrate, this time) asking questions of the panel of jurors to determine whether they can hear the case before them and render an impartial verdict based upon the facts and evidence, as presented by the lawyers, and the law, as delivered by instructions to the jurors from the magistrate. Some of the questions involved in voir dire are questions about whether any of the jurors are personally familiar with any of the parties in the case, including the parties, the lawyers, magistrate, the court staff, and any witnesses that are scheduled to be called during the proceedings. Some questions are asked about whether the schedule of the court, including the length of the trial and the schedule of each day's proceedings, would cause significant hardship for any potential juror. Other questions are asked about the subject of the case and whether any of the panel feel their experiences regarding that subject would preclude them from being able to fairly try the case and render their verdict. Some questions are asked about the employment (or previous employment) of the panel of jurors, others about experiences the jurors may have had in relation to subjects that may be relevant to the case, although they may not be directly related to the case. Depending on their answers to any of the questions, the lawyers for each side may request that members of the panel be struck (excused) from the panel "for cause," indicating that the response a panel member has given, in the opinion of the lawyer, would prevent them from being an impartial juror. The magistrate makes a ruling on the request. If the panel member is struck, they are removed from the panel and returned to the potential juror pool, where they may be empaneled on a different trial and the voir dire process begun again. The panel is sworn to answer all of the questions put to them honestly and truthfully, and it was specifically mentioned in the trial I served upon that being struck from a panel means nothing about the person at all, just that the particular circumstances of this case say that this panelist won't be able to render a fair and just verdict or otherwise able to devote their attention fully to the case.
I did a significant amount of talking, in my opinion, during voir dire. Having been assigned a number that was situated near the front of the space certainly helped, I think, but the lawyers for both sides did their best to spread questions around the entire panel, so as to get an idea of what the entire panel's opinions on things will be. There were a few strikes for cause during the process, but not many.
After the matters of the strikes for cause, each of the sides of the case has the option to exercise a limited number of "peremptory challenges," which are strikes of a panelist with no need for a cause to be given. The eventual goal of this particular case was to produce a panel of twelve jurors, plus alternates, who would hear the case and render a verdict. In this particular case, the potential jurors started at the smallest number, and as challenges were exercised (the phrase in this particular case was "the [side] thanks and excuses juror number [z]"), the makeup of the panel changed. In this case, the prosecution accepts or excuses jurors by number, and then the defense accepts or excuses jurors based on the current potential composition. Several of the jurors that were sitting close to me were excused through peremptory challenges. After a jury has been agreed to by both sides, any remaining persons in the panel who are not sworn as the jury are released back into the pool of potential jurors, who may, if their term of jury service is still active, be selected into another case's panel and go through the voir dire process again. If their term of jury service is finished, after reporting their status to jury administration, they are released from further service requirements. So it is entirely possible for a person to be empaneled for a case (or many cases), but not actually reach the point where they are sworn as a juror to any given case.
The persons accepted as the jury for the trial are then sworn to a second oath that they will hear and try the case fairly and impartially, without bias or prejudice. The initial number they received for the empaneling is replaced by which number they are for the trial, but during the entirety of the process, all jurors are still referred to by numbers. At this point…there's still a significant amount of waiting, actually. Because all throughout this process, there are arguments, filings, motions, and other things done by the lawyers for both sides, in the presence of the magistrate, for which the jury or even the jury panel is not present. All throughout this process, starting with being empaneled, there have also been regular instructions not to talk about the case with any person, nor do research in any way related to the case, nor visit any place mentioned in the case, nor attempt to find evidence or facts about the case, or any other thing that might be construed as having an outside opinion influence someone on the case. So no talking to the lawyers, the witnesses, other jurors or panel members, family members, or anyone else about the case, or even being in the same general space as any persons (who are not jurors) associated with the case, in case there is the possibility that a juror might overhear something that would prejudice them. It's also why I waited until the end of the trial and the delivery of the verdict to write and post this, as doing so during the course of the trial would be potentially improper. Even though I've tried very specifically to not talk about any of the information that was specific to the case I tried that would make it identifiable by specific persons or subjects involved in the case.
The jury has a room to which they are staged and wait during any portion of the trial or deliberations where the jury is not present. This includes scheduled recesses, lunches, and any recesses granted by any of the lawyers during the trial. The jury room has attached bathrooms, so that there is no risk of accidental improper conversations between jurors and persons involved in the case, as well as places to stash belongings and other such things. The jury room I was in was not Spartan, but was also not lavish in any sort of way.
The course of the case is generally that the complainant or plaintiff (a prosecutor acting on behalf of the State, in this case, as the State is the plaintiff in all criminal cases) calls forth witnesses to give testimony, as well as requesting the admission of documents and other tangible objects as evidence (usually referred to as "exhibits") to build the case they wish to present to the jury, asking questions of the sworn witness about factual matters and their expert opinions and conclusions in relation to those facts. The person calling the witness gives a "direct examination" first, at which point the opposing lawyers engage in a "cross examination" to ask further questions about the testimony and evidence received and any inconsistencies or alternate interpretations that may be possible of the events described and evidence admitted. Any topics covered in the cross examination are then allowed to be discussed by the initial counsel in "re-direct examination," the opposing lawyers are then allowed to "re-cross" any of the topics brought up in the re-direct, until such point as both the direct and cross examiners have no further questions to ask of the witness, at which point the witness is released and another witness called to begin the process again. Once the complainant has exhausted all of their witnesses and delivered the evidence they wish to present, the defendant and their counsel are given the opportunity to call witnesses and present evidence of their own for the case, with the roles of direct examiner and cross examiner reversed. They do not have to take on this opportunity, and for the trial that I was sworn to, there was a specific instruction given by the magistrate that the defendant choosing not to provide witnesses, evidence, or testimony on their behalf was not to be taken as an admission of guilt or wrongdoing or otherwise influence the jury's decision about the facts of the case.
During the entirety of the examination and exhibition process, either lawyer is allowed to object to a question, a line of questions, or a piece of evidence the opposition has asked or presented, stating the reason for their objection to the question or piece of evidence. The magistrate makes a decision about whether to sustain the objection or overrule the objection and allow the question or presentation of evidence to proceed.
Once both sides have rested, indicating they have no more witnesses to call and exhibits to present, the magistrate then delivers written instructions to the jury about the law or laws that the defendant has been charged under, including definitions of terms in those laws, instructions to the jury about their conduct during the deliberations, and at least one instruction to the jury about what is necessary for the jury to find for one side or the other in the case. With those instructions in hand, the complainant's lawyer gets to make a closing argument, making reference to the testimony and the instructions, as to why the jury should find in their favor. The defendant's lawyer gets to do the same, and at least for the case that I tried, the prosecutor was allowed to make a final rebuttal to the defense's closing arguments.
At this point, the jury begins deliberations. The jurors elect a presiding juror to help run their deliberations and make sure that all the matters set before them are discussed and conclusions reached. Based on their notes and memory of the testimony and examinations of the witnesses, and the exhibits that have been entered into evidence, the jury talks among themselves, makes arguments, refers to evidence, re-examines the exhibits, and otherwise discusses the case that has been presented to them by both sides. The jury continues to discuss until, at least for my case, all of the jurors have reached the same verdict on the case with regard to all of the issues of the law set before them. The jury's verdict is recorded and then, depending on the court, the magistrate, the presiding juror, or another officer of the court reads the verdict of the jury to the defendant. Once the verdict has been read, the magistrate polls the jury. Each member of the jury is asked two questions:
So long as all of the jurors reply in the affirmative to both questions, the verdict is entered into the record of the court officially. After this, the court thanks the jury for their service and officially releases them from their obligations to the court (and their requirements of secrecy for the case.) After the jury is thanked and dismissed, everyone awaits the next time they may be summoned for jury service, and the process begins again.
Depending on the verdict and the type of trial, there may be a further session where the jury is not present to handle awards, fines, or jail sentences for defendants or awards for the winning side in the dispute. My trial was one that had this further session, but the jury is explicitly not present for that part of the trial. Any person who wanted to know about the trial would be able to look up the public data for that trial, including the verdict and any sentences attached in the case of a verdict that requires one, but it is usually some time after the trial before a sentencing hearing, if needed, is scheduled.
The last thing offered to the jury for this particular case was the opportunity to talk to the magistrate about any questions that could be answered by the magistrate about the process or about themselves. The magistrate also indicated it is the usual practice to have the counsel for both sides of the dispute to answer and ask questions to and from the jury. The lawyers are present, according to the magistrate, so that they can improve their advocacy skills by asking questions and receiving feedback from the jury. However, our prosecutor was unavailable on the day the verdict was delivered, and the defense counsel had places they needed to go, so we only had the magistrate present to answer questions that we might have had about the process of the trial and/or any of the things mentioned. It was still rather informative.
I hope this was informative as a look about the jury process in the United States, from the perspective of someone called to jury service, empaneled, and then sworn to a jury in a trial. If you have any questions, I'll do my best to answer them.
The process, in the United States, starts by making random selections from a database composed of persons who have driver licenses, identity cards, voter registrations, or other documents that indicate they are of age to serve as jurors in a case. A "speedy and public" jury trial is guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States in all cases where a jury trial is warranted or guaranteed. Which often means a lot of trials, and subsequently, a lot of persons will be called for jury service over the course of any given calendar year, for trials that can be at any level of jurisdiction of the court. Generally, courts attempt to have the trial in the smallest court level that has appropriate jurisdiction for the offenses charged against the defendant (or of the complaint made by one party against the other), so while it is rare that a person may be called for jury service at the federal jurisdiction level, it is not rare that a person will be called for jury service.
Once the list of persons to be called for service has been finalized, those persons are sent a summons for jury service. This initial summons is for a date in the future where the person will be expected to report to the courthouse and be available for the court as a potential juror. Persons receiving a summons may respond by accepting the summons and saying they will report for service on the date indicated, or they can ask the court to excuse them from the service for reasons indicating hardship, either for the person themselves or from their employer, that jury service would cause. The first time I received a jury summons, I was a university student several counties away, and requested to be excused from service based on the disruption to my studies and the length of travel that would be required for me to properly attend jury service. That request was granted. This time around, I checked with my employer, and my employer found no reason to ask for me to be excused. So, having sent my response in to the court, the first part of the process was complete.
I received an identifying badge that had a number and barcode on it, with instructions to call a telephone line or check a website to see if their group of persons have been called to report to the correct courthouse's jury administration room and scan that badge's barcode in to indicate that I had reported as directed. (Failure to report for jury service is a misdemeanor offense, we are told.) My group was called on the first potential day for service, so I went in. After enough of the people reported in, the jury administration staff played for us two videos, one that walked us through the process of jury service and its importance in civil society, and a second video about implicit biases and the need to avoid allowing them to influence decisions in cases. After this, the jury administrator also mentioned certain situations where a person would be excluded from jury service and other situations where the jury administration staff wants to have a conversation with a person to see whether they would also be excluded.
- Non-citizens are excluded from jury service.
- Persons whose official residence is outside the jurisdiction of the court are excluded from jury service.
- Persons convicted of a felony offense who have not had their rights restored to them are excluded from jury service.
- Persons for whom English is not their primary language are not excluded from jury service, but a conversation was requested, because during a trial, no outside information is allowed, not even dictionary definition lookups, and therefore if a person feels like they will not be able to understand the language spoken and written during the course of the trial, they may request excusal to ensure the trial's fairness.
After this, the waiting begins. On any given day, there may be cases before the court that request a number of jurors, called a panel, to appear before the magistrate, the lawyers / counselors, and the parties to the case and answer questions. The number of jurors requested for a panel varies, depending on the jurisdiction of the court and the seriousness of the offense committed. On the first day, several panels were requested, but I was not on any of them. Once all of the panels for the day had been decided, persons who were not on a panel of jurors were released for the day with instructions to call the same telephone line and/or consult the website for instructions about whether they would be required to report back the next day for further waiting. (There were lunch breaks and other such things.) Potential jurors are still referred to by group numbers in this cycle.
For some significant number of persons called, this will be the sum total of their jury service. They will report when requested, wait to see if they will be empaneled, will not be empaneled, and at the end of the time specified for their service, they will be dismissed with the thanks of the court and the pittance they are paid for their jury service. Many persons called to jury service desire this outcome, as it is the least disruption their lives and workplaces will have for performing their civic duty.
Selection of a panel of jurors is, to the best of my knowledge, random from the list of persons who have reported in that day for service. Persons so designated are attached to a specific case before the court and identified with a number. From this point forward, the person attached to the case is referred to solely by their number. In the jury administration space where I have been, each case that has requested a panel has a color or style badge associated with it, and all persons put on the panel for that jury will be wearing a badge of that color or style with their number on it. Once a person has been attached to a case on a jury panel, they are no longer following the directions for unattached persons, but are instead following the directions of the court, usually in the form of the judicial assistant assigned to the courtroom. Attached jurors then begin a process known as voir dire.
The process of voir dire involves the lawyers for each side of the case and the court (in the form of the magistrate, this time) asking questions of the panel of jurors to determine whether they can hear the case before them and render an impartial verdict based upon the facts and evidence, as presented by the lawyers, and the law, as delivered by instructions to the jurors from the magistrate. Some of the questions involved in voir dire are questions about whether any of the jurors are personally familiar with any of the parties in the case, including the parties, the lawyers, magistrate, the court staff, and any witnesses that are scheduled to be called during the proceedings. Some questions are asked about whether the schedule of the court, including the length of the trial and the schedule of each day's proceedings, would cause significant hardship for any potential juror. Other questions are asked about the subject of the case and whether any of the panel feel their experiences regarding that subject would preclude them from being able to fairly try the case and render their verdict. Some questions are asked about the employment (or previous employment) of the panel of jurors, others about experiences the jurors may have had in relation to subjects that may be relevant to the case, although they may not be directly related to the case. Depending on their answers to any of the questions, the lawyers for each side may request that members of the panel be struck (excused) from the panel "for cause," indicating that the response a panel member has given, in the opinion of the lawyer, would prevent them from being an impartial juror. The magistrate makes a ruling on the request. If the panel member is struck, they are removed from the panel and returned to the potential juror pool, where they may be empaneled on a different trial and the voir dire process begun again. The panel is sworn to answer all of the questions put to them honestly and truthfully, and it was specifically mentioned in the trial I served upon that being struck from a panel means nothing about the person at all, just that the particular circumstances of this case say that this panelist won't be able to render a fair and just verdict or otherwise able to devote their attention fully to the case.
I did a significant amount of talking, in my opinion, during voir dire. Having been assigned a number that was situated near the front of the space certainly helped, I think, but the lawyers for both sides did their best to spread questions around the entire panel, so as to get an idea of what the entire panel's opinions on things will be. There were a few strikes for cause during the process, but not many.
After the matters of the strikes for cause, each of the sides of the case has the option to exercise a limited number of "peremptory challenges," which are strikes of a panelist with no need for a cause to be given. The eventual goal of this particular case was to produce a panel of twelve jurors, plus alternates, who would hear the case and render a verdict. In this particular case, the potential jurors started at the smallest number, and as challenges were exercised (the phrase in this particular case was "the [side] thanks and excuses juror number [z]"), the makeup of the panel changed. In this case, the prosecution accepts or excuses jurors by number, and then the defense accepts or excuses jurors based on the current potential composition. Several of the jurors that were sitting close to me were excused through peremptory challenges. After a jury has been agreed to by both sides, any remaining persons in the panel who are not sworn as the jury are released back into the pool of potential jurors, who may, if their term of jury service is still active, be selected into another case's panel and go through the voir dire process again. If their term of jury service is finished, after reporting their status to jury administration, they are released from further service requirements. So it is entirely possible for a person to be empaneled for a case (or many cases), but not actually reach the point where they are sworn as a juror to any given case.
The persons accepted as the jury for the trial are then sworn to a second oath that they will hear and try the case fairly and impartially, without bias or prejudice. The initial number they received for the empaneling is replaced by which number they are for the trial, but during the entirety of the process, all jurors are still referred to by numbers. At this point…there's still a significant amount of waiting, actually. Because all throughout this process, there are arguments, filings, motions, and other things done by the lawyers for both sides, in the presence of the magistrate, for which the jury or even the jury panel is not present. All throughout this process, starting with being empaneled, there have also been regular instructions not to talk about the case with any person, nor do research in any way related to the case, nor visit any place mentioned in the case, nor attempt to find evidence or facts about the case, or any other thing that might be construed as having an outside opinion influence someone on the case. So no talking to the lawyers, the witnesses, other jurors or panel members, family members, or anyone else about the case, or even being in the same general space as any persons (who are not jurors) associated with the case, in case there is the possibility that a juror might overhear something that would prejudice them. It's also why I waited until the end of the trial and the delivery of the verdict to write and post this, as doing so during the course of the trial would be potentially improper. Even though I've tried very specifically to not talk about any of the information that was specific to the case I tried that would make it identifiable by specific persons or subjects involved in the case.
The jury has a room to which they are staged and wait during any portion of the trial or deliberations where the jury is not present. This includes scheduled recesses, lunches, and any recesses granted by any of the lawyers during the trial. The jury room has attached bathrooms, so that there is no risk of accidental improper conversations between jurors and persons involved in the case, as well as places to stash belongings and other such things. The jury room I was in was not Spartan, but was also not lavish in any sort of way.
The course of the case is generally that the complainant or plaintiff (a prosecutor acting on behalf of the State, in this case, as the State is the plaintiff in all criminal cases) calls forth witnesses to give testimony, as well as requesting the admission of documents and other tangible objects as evidence (usually referred to as "exhibits") to build the case they wish to present to the jury, asking questions of the sworn witness about factual matters and their expert opinions and conclusions in relation to those facts. The person calling the witness gives a "direct examination" first, at which point the opposing lawyers engage in a "cross examination" to ask further questions about the testimony and evidence received and any inconsistencies or alternate interpretations that may be possible of the events described and evidence admitted. Any topics covered in the cross examination are then allowed to be discussed by the initial counsel in "re-direct examination," the opposing lawyers are then allowed to "re-cross" any of the topics brought up in the re-direct, until such point as both the direct and cross examiners have no further questions to ask of the witness, at which point the witness is released and another witness called to begin the process again. Once the complainant has exhausted all of their witnesses and delivered the evidence they wish to present, the defendant and their counsel are given the opportunity to call witnesses and present evidence of their own for the case, with the roles of direct examiner and cross examiner reversed. They do not have to take on this opportunity, and for the trial that I was sworn to, there was a specific instruction given by the magistrate that the defendant choosing not to provide witnesses, evidence, or testimony on their behalf was not to be taken as an admission of guilt or wrongdoing or otherwise influence the jury's decision about the facts of the case.
During the entirety of the examination and exhibition process, either lawyer is allowed to object to a question, a line of questions, or a piece of evidence the opposition has asked or presented, stating the reason for their objection to the question or piece of evidence. The magistrate makes a decision about whether to sustain the objection or overrule the objection and allow the question or presentation of evidence to proceed.
Once both sides have rested, indicating they have no more witnesses to call and exhibits to present, the magistrate then delivers written instructions to the jury about the law or laws that the defendant has been charged under, including definitions of terms in those laws, instructions to the jury about their conduct during the deliberations, and at least one instruction to the jury about what is necessary for the jury to find for one side or the other in the case. With those instructions in hand, the complainant's lawyer gets to make a closing argument, making reference to the testimony and the instructions, as to why the jury should find in their favor. The defendant's lawyer gets to do the same, and at least for the case that I tried, the prosecutor was allowed to make a final rebuttal to the defense's closing arguments.
At this point, the jury begins deliberations. The jurors elect a presiding juror to help run their deliberations and make sure that all the matters set before them are discussed and conclusions reached. Based on their notes and memory of the testimony and examinations of the witnesses, and the exhibits that have been entered into evidence, the jury talks among themselves, makes arguments, refers to evidence, re-examines the exhibits, and otherwise discusses the case that has been presented to them by both sides. The jury continues to discuss until, at least for my case, all of the jurors have reached the same verdict on the case with regard to all of the issues of the law set before them. The jury's verdict is recorded and then, depending on the court, the magistrate, the presiding juror, or another officer of the court reads the verdict of the jury to the defendant. Once the verdict has been read, the magistrate polls the jury. Each member of the jury is asked two questions:
- Is this your verdict?
- Is this the verdict of the jury?
So long as all of the jurors reply in the affirmative to both questions, the verdict is entered into the record of the court officially. After this, the court thanks the jury for their service and officially releases them from their obligations to the court (and their requirements of secrecy for the case.) After the jury is thanked and dismissed, everyone awaits the next time they may be summoned for jury service, and the process begins again.
Depending on the verdict and the type of trial, there may be a further session where the jury is not present to handle awards, fines, or jail sentences for defendants or awards for the winning side in the dispute. My trial was one that had this further session, but the jury is explicitly not present for that part of the trial. Any person who wanted to know about the trial would be able to look up the public data for that trial, including the verdict and any sentences attached in the case of a verdict that requires one, but it is usually some time after the trial before a sentencing hearing, if needed, is scheduled.
The last thing offered to the jury for this particular case was the opportunity to talk to the magistrate about any questions that could be answered by the magistrate about the process or about themselves. The magistrate also indicated it is the usual practice to have the counsel for both sides of the dispute to answer and ask questions to and from the jury. The lawyers are present, according to the magistrate, so that they can improve their advocacy skills by asking questions and receiving feedback from the jury. However, our prosecutor was unavailable on the day the verdict was delivered, and the defense counsel had places they needed to go, so we only had the magistrate present to answer questions that we might have had about the process of the trial and/or any of the things mentioned. It was still rather informative.
I hope this was informative as a look about the jury process in the United States, from the perspective of someone called to jury service, empaneled, and then sworn to a jury in a trial. If you have any questions, I'll do my best to answer them.
