Jury duty and constitutional issues
So rarely does a scenario that you've thought about for years actually come to pass exactly the way you envisioned it, but such a thing happened to me yesterday when I was called in for jury duty.
I, like [I hope] all members of this 'board think that many of the firearm laws on the books are unconstitutional. I've rolled around in my head what I would do if I was asked to pass judgment on a law that I personally felt was unconstitutional. There is of course jury nullification which is the big hammer - and something to avoid if there are better ways.
Well yesterday I found out just how that situation played out for me.
I was called into Judge Erin Sokol's (Division 10's District Court Chief Judge - Colorado Springs) courtroom along with about 50 other potential jury members, which immediately set off alarms that this was going to be a reasonably big case. There was a real court recorder - another sign of a big case (many courts are just electronically recorded these days).
Sokol impressed me, she was friendly, smiled a lot (I like people that smile), set people at ease, explained things very clearly and treated all the jurors very kindly - yet was also efficient and businesslike.
First order of business was for all the potential jurors, en masse, to swear to tell the truth.
Then she read the charges:
- Illegal possession of a firearm
- Discharging a firearm within city limits
- Child abuse (there was a child in the car when the gun was discharged).
I immediately realized that the first charge was exactly what I had given careful thought to over the years and that I could not find the defendant guilty of that charge because I felt it was unconstitutional. However, I was unsure how to proceed from that point.
The next couple hours were spent finding out who had personal connections or bias with the police, witnesses and defendant. Who could not be impartial, etc. In all cases Judge Sokol carefully questioned anyone who had a connection or bias to determine if it could be put aside or would it color their decision in any way. Some were revealed to be biased, some not. She'd spend probably a minimum of five minutes questioning the juror on finer and finer nuances until the juror came up with a hard answer. It was pretty impressive.
She also gave the jurors a chance to speak in private if they were uncomfortable. About four chose that option and she ceased questioning them at that point and told them that she'd speak to them later.
Finally, at the end of this process she asked something along the lines of "Is there anyone who cannot judge the defendant on these charges, according to my instructions?" The "according to my instructions" was the clincher, and my hand went up (I was the only one).
She asked me why. At this point I made a personal decision, others may choose to do differently. Do I tell her my constitutional reasoning, potentially poisoning the entire jury pool, or tell her privately? I told her I'd like to speak to her privately.
We were given a break immediately afterwards and the people that asked to speak privately were told to wait near the door. One by one the "private" people were called in. After 5-10 minutes they'd re-emerge. I'm sure they were each questioned in the manner others were questioned, the judge asking more and more detailed questions until the juror themselves gave a hard answer on if they'd be biased or not.
I was called in. Present was the Judge, prosecutor, defendant, his two defense attorneys, and their two PIs.
I was nervous, so the following is an approximation of what I said.
Judge Sokol: "Why do you feel you can't judge the defendant on the charges?"
Me: "I could not find the defendant guilty on the charge of illegal possession of a firearm because I feel that law is unconstitutional."
At this point Sokol broke into a huge, sincere (not malicious) grin and asked:
Sokol: "Even though Colorado law states it's illegal for a felon to possess a firearm?" *
Me: "Yes, you ask us to follow the law, and the Constitution is the ultimate law and the possession law is in conflict with it."
At some point I mentioned how the Constitution was written for the people and its arbitration starts with the people.
She then asked if the prosecution or defense had any questions for me - they didn't and still smiling thanked me for divulging this information and dismissed me. Bang. Unlike the five or more minutes for anyone else, I was over and done with in about a minute, two tops.
When we were called back in, about 12 people were let go from the jury pool, including me.
Someday I would really like to serve on a jury, but that case was not the one for me.
Note that some might say I should have kept quiet and used jury nullification for the illegal possession charge. But I feel (again, personal decision) that not responding in the affirmative (raising my hand) to the question "Is there anyone who cannot judge the defendant on these charges, according to my instructions?" would have violated my oath to be truthful.
...and that's my jury experience.
* Later I came to realize that when Sokol asked "Even though Colorado law states it's illegal for a felon to possess a firearm?" she gave away that the defendant was a convicted felon. My guess is that she had already decided to release me from the jury at that point and was just interested in just how principled my constitutional position was.
