Trials develop patience..

Sun, 23 Dec 2007 00:01:10 GMT

We've had some small trials this week.

On Tuesday night, while getting ready for bed, Emma was playing in our house, and fell, catching herself with her hands, and broke her elbow. Apparenly when kids fall on their hands, they don't break their hands or wrists, they break their elbows. You couldn't see the fracture in the x-ray, and it must have been small, but they put her in a half-cast and sling anyway. See pictures on flickr. The emergency room was recently updated, and pretty nice, but it still took 2 hours from check-in to check-out, and it seemed to be a slow night anyway.

Thursday we had a non-stop flight to Salt Lake from Seattle that happened to arrive just at the same time as a blizzard. They had us circle a few times, and I think they were going to have us approach to land, but ended up pulling up and diverted to Boise to refuel. In all that turbulence, Emma, who's typically a great flyer, really started complaining. We thought it was mostly lack of sleep, but then she threw up all over herself and me.

We cleaned ourselves off with paper towels, and Emma changed into a clean set of clothes that we had handy. I frequently get dizzy in flights and cars, and so I had to endure the 2 hour round-trip to Boise feeling terrible. I was able to get off in Boise and buy a new T-shirt so I didn't stink too much. We gave Emma some water, which prompted more vomiting, and we finally arrived in Salt Lake about 3 hours late. FYI: We looked it up, and after vomiting, you shouldn't eat anything for 8 hours, and only have tiny amounts of water if you really need it.

Emma was feeling fine the next day, and is using her arm a lot more now so we'll try taking the cast off tomorrow.

Talking about Mother's Day 8 course meal 2007

Tue, 15 May 2007 21:55:05 GMT

Check out the fancy meal created by my friend Thayn for Mothers Day.

Below is just the main course. Check out his blog for details and all of the 8 courses.

Jury Duty journal

Wed, 12 Apr 2006 05:09:25 GMT

I was called for jury duty for the first time earlier this month. The following is a writeup of my experience. At the bottom you can find a summary of interesting facts and things I learned. I've left out almost all trial-specific details. Contact me if you want more specific details.

Jury Duty Journal

Monday, March 13, 2006 – Day 1

I entered the Juror Assembly Room in the King County courthouse at 8am. The room was filled with somewhere around 250 people waiting to be called to a jury. After filling out a brief bio and watching an introductory video, they started calling jurors. The first case needed 80 potential jurors, and I was the 7^th person to be called. After a short wait, we were ushered into a large courtroom to learn about the case. We learned that it was a 1^st degree murder charge, and that the case would last 3 weeks. We were given the opportunity to specify that being called as a juror would create a hardship for us, and thus request an exemption. About 25 people were exempted from the case, with very little explanation required. Most were due to self-employed, or non-compensated work, or important events coming up.

After lunch (which is from 12:00 to 1:30 most days), we met in a smaller courtroom, and the lawyers started asking questions to the jurors to get to know us. Instead of individually interviewing each of us, they asked questions to the broad group, only sometimes targeting specific people. They started by asking typical questions such as “Does anyone have any experience working with gangs?” and “Do you think police officers are infallible?” The lawyers touched on topics of abilities with firearms, relatives of police officers, dislike of the death penalty, murders or assaults of friends or relatives, and similar topics to surface any potential biases. At around 4:00pm we broke for the day. They only dismissed a few people who had experiences that would have made it difficult to sit on a case involving a similar crime.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006 – Day 2

Court days start at 9am, but they’re frequently hearing motions or whatever outside the presence of the jury before things really get started. The lawyers started asking questions about things that can influence eyewitness testimony, people’s ability to remember events accurately, the fact that the first story (or testimony) you hear is psychologically given more credit, the definition of “beyond a reasonable doubt,” etc. I can think of 2 reasons for this style of questioning. First, to prepare our minds for the trial. If we know (or remember) up front that testimony can be fallible, and have a good idea of what is a reasonable doubt, we’ll be more open-minded to the case. They never covered these topics in the trial (so far), after all, they’re not testimony. Second, to identify anyone who might be psychologically or intellectually difficult for one side or the other. Such as someone who couldn’t trust anyone’s word (eyewitness) or might not get the definition of “a reasonable doubt.” The next series of questioning was one that I didn’t expect. The defense attorney wanted to get rid of anyone who would keep the jury organized during deliberations. He asked questions to find out who managed people in their jobs, and who was a good note taker. The prosecution wanted to get rid of anyone who might be difficult, unpredictable, or otherwise hang the jury.

I was quiet during most rounds of questioning, and only answered 2 questions. One about the fact that the knowledge of prior events can help you draw conclusions about a given event. The second about whether the TV show CSI realistically depicts most crime scenes and investigations.

After finishing their questioning, the lawyers one-by-one chose someone from the jury pool to excuse with no reasons given. Roughly 16 people were removed, with the defense lawyer being much more selective. The lawyers and judge would use the rest of the day for their own business and they excused the jury until the next day.

Wednesday, March 15, 2006 – Day 3

At 9:30 the court began, with the lawyers giving their opening arguments. These are quite interesting, because the lawyers summarize what they are about to prove, and it’s the first we hear about what actually happened. The prosecution will present 2 eyewitnesses and a prisoner who spoke with the defendant in jail to prove their case. The defense will present another eyewitness, who will claim that the defendant wasn’t the one who committed the crime. We realize that the case will come down to “who to believe.”

The opening arguments go quickly and the prosecution calls their first 3 witnesses, who are police officers. They give the background to the scene. Thus, the first few witnesses are fairly boring, because they don’t know what happened, they just convey what they found afterwards. There was essentially no evidence found.

Thursday, March 16, 2006 – Day 4

The prosecution calls 2 witnesses, both detectives who worked on the case. They present evidence. Today we realized how slow court is. Between 9am and 4pm, the main court hours, we officially get 2 hours of breaks, but today we spent at least another hour or two waiting. We’re getting to know each other as a jury and realize how cruel it is that we’re 12 random people with nothing in common but a single common experience (this trial) and we’re not allowed to talk about it (until deliberation).

Monday, March 20, 2006 – Day 5

Today was not a good day to be a prosecutor. Two witnesses who were at the crime scene testified—well, they were on the stand anyway. The first witness appeared because he was subpoenaed, but he did not cooperate. After struggling to get the witness to answer questions the prosecutor said to the judge: “Your Honor, may I have permission to lead the witness?” “Is the witness hostile?” “Absolutely.” “Yes you may.” From this point, the prosecutor was able to actually make some progress. The witness (and at least 2 later witnesses) had given sworn testimony on prior occasions on their eyewitness accounts. In court, the testimony of all 3 differed somewhat significantly from the prior statements given. When the witnesses would “forget” something, or make a conflicting statement, they would be directed to transcripts of the prior statements to “refresh their memory.” The judge directed the jury that “the transcripts are provided are for helping to judge the reliability of the witness, not for the truth of the matter.” After hearing that several times I finally realized what she was actually saying, and what that means. I can imagine the difficulty many people would have comprehending the subtleties implied by that statement.

So, the original witness was painstakingly led through his testimony in which he said that any of his prior testimonies were lies that he felt he had to tell or he would go to jail. He was difficult to work with, and ended up being mostly worthless. At the conclusion of his questioning, the prosecutor made an awesome cutting remark at the witness, which the judge slightly rebuked him for, and had it stricken from the record and told the jury to disregard it. The witness had just said: “You’re not a man if you can’t protect your family.” The prosecutor finished his questioning with: “You and I have a different opinion of what it means to be a man.” This may not sound like much, but after 5 days of dry question and answer sessions on the facts, and over an hour of listening to this guy lie in court it was very welcome.

The next witness also seemed to disregard any prior testimonies and ended up saying that she had blocked everything from that day out of her memory. She also ended up being fairly worthless as a witness.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006 – Day 6

Today there were 3 witnesses, one eye-witness, one police, and one confidant (for lack of a better term). The police (crime lab head actually) was boring but the other two gave very reasonable testimonies. Not much notable today.

Note: I’m adding this note after the trial is over. I didn’t even realize it, but one of these witnesses was essentially the entire case for the prosecution. I wish I had taken more notes and paid more attention, because the couple hours she was on the stand were some of the most important hours of the trial.

Wednesday, March 22, 2006 – Day 7

Today, the prosecution called 1 more witness (boring police-related stuff) and rested. The defense called 2 fairly quick witnesses. The case seems to be winding down. Not much new has happened.

Monday, March 27, 2006 – Day 8

Today was interesting because the defense called a witness who is an expert in experimental psychology. The witness’s job was to testify that sometimes eyewitnesses can be wrong. He does research on memory and attention and such things. As he testified, it was very obvious that he was favoring the defense. Then the prosecution cross examined the witness and brought up some interesting facts. This witness is paid more by defense in trials than as a professor at a University. The prosecutor brought up that the expert witness provided a sample script to the defense lawyers, sometimes seems biased in favor of the defense, and that several professors have published opinions questioning if expert testimony in this area should be provided at all. The prosecutor essentially tried to make it seem absurd that the professor should be paid to testify about this.

The defense also had the defendant testify today. He told his version of the events, essentially pointing a finger at his friend, who was also there at the scene.

Tuesday, March 28, 2006 – Day 9

One of the witnesses had previously testified to having some alcoholic drinks before being at the crime scene, so today the defense brought in an expert to state how much alcohol she had in her blood. A prior statement was also read from a new witness because the witness was not available to appear in court. It was really slow.

Wednesday, March 29, 2006 – Day 10

Today was the last day of the trial. The prosecution and defense were able to call witnesses again to answer more questions. I’m not sure any of it was necessary, but it was ok, because it didn’t last very long. After a long lunch, the judge passed out instructions to the jurors, and read them. It explained the law, and the process that the jury was to follow. It is interesting that this is the first instruction on the law that the jurors received.

Next, the lawyers gave their closing arguments. I haven’t mentioned in my journal much about my beliefs in the case, but at this point, I was mostly undecided leaning towards not guilty. As the prosecutor gave his closing argument, he really put everything together nicely, and made it seem quite clear that the defendant was guilty. He really convinced me, which is saying something, because I don’t feel like the type of person who is easily swayed. I usually immediately question arguments. But in this case, I really believed the prosecutor was right. Then the defense started their closing arguments, and I couldn’t believe it, but they totally convinced me that the defendant was innocent. The defense also made some interesting general points about verdicts in general. He reminded us about how hard it is to find someone guilty. We must be sure beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a pretty strict measure. He reminded us that Lincoln said that he’d rather have 10 guilty men go unpunished than punish an innocent man. After the defense finished, and I was agonizing inside, trying to figure out how I was letting myself feel so wishy-washy, the prosecution gave their final statement, encouraging the jury to find the defendant guilty. I decided that I would have to clear my mind and look at the facts.

At this point, the judge announced who the 3 alternate jurors were, and I was one of them, and I went home.

Conclusion

All the jurors had exchanged emails before the last day, so we’ve communicated via email about what happened. After 3 full days of deliberations, the jury found the defendant not guilty. There simply wasn’t enough evidence. One eyewitness, who wasn’t very convincing was not enough with no hard evidence.

Interesting facts:

15 Jurors chosen from a pool of 80 for a murder trial, which lasted 3 weeks.
Lawyers not only question the jury pool for biases, but to prepare you to hear the case, and to weed out either people who would be natural leaders, or who could take a strong position without proper reasoning.
The jury was led out of the room repeatedly due to discussions that had to take place without the jury. Jurors were only in court for about 3 hours a day.
Jurors couldn’t talk with the other juror members about the case until during deliberations.

Things I learned:

Witnesses are very limited in that they cannot speak on behalf of someone else, give opinions, or state what they think about something. They’re restricted to giving facts that they know first hand.
Trial by a jury is horribly inefficient, but it does do a reasonable job of checking the system. It really protects against corruption better than any other system I could think of.
Despite its great ability to keep corruption out of the system, the drawbacks of the jury/trial system are as follows:
- Jurors have no knowledge of the law.
- Often, the most capable jurors are weeded out during jury selection.
- Everything is black or white. A witness doesn’t say “I’m pretty sure” or give an opinion or anything along those lines. They say what they know and nothing more.
- A good, fast thinking lawyer, that knows how to make persuasive arguments can really change the outcome. The affect what is admitted, the believability of the witnesses, and how things come together in the end.
- It’s up to the opposing lawyer to object to improper behavior from the other lawyer. The prosecution can lead the witness if the opposing lawyer doesn’t object.
- Jurors are not given a transcript of the case during deliberations. They must rely on memory and notes they took.

Investing Journal: Personal