Yippee! I was struck from the Henrico County jury today, and I’m back to blogging. I was fully prepared to participate in the three-day jury trial of a man charged with heroin distribution, but someone — I’m betting it was the defense attorney — gave me the heave-ho.
I don’t know the reason, but I’m guessing it may be connected to when the prosecuting attorney, upon learning that I published a blog, asked me of my political leanings. I replied that I was a fiscal and free-market conservative. But conceivably, the defense attorney deemed it a mark against me when he asked if I regularly read the Metro section of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, and I replied that I had. Maybe it was the combination of the two — uh, oh, we’ve got a conservative, 64-year-old white guy here who faithfully reads the crime stories in the local newspaper!
What defense attorney in the world would want me on the jury?
This is only the second time in my life that I’d been called for jury duty, and it was interesting to view the process of jury selection from the inside. The jurors represented a broad cross-section of Henrico County society in terms of race/ethnicity, although the panel probably skewed to older citizens and middle-class occupations — no derelicts in this group. That may have something to do with the fact that felons are excluded from the jury pool.
When asked if any of us, or any of our close relatives, had been the victim of a crime. one woman said her father had been murdered, and one fellow said two of his friends had died of heroin overdoses. Another woman owned up to having worked for the Drug Enforcement Agency, although in an HR capacity. Needless to say, all three were struck.
After getting a look at the defendant — he looked somewhat elderly, with a scruffy, gray-white beard, not like the stereotypical street thug — I’ll be curious to know what happens to him. Maybe I can read about it in the Times-Dispatch.
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