Has anybody ever served Federal Jury Duty while living in The Villages?
 

This was in 2009 or so. It was a federal Jury up in Ocala that brought in people from a number of counties. I recall someone from Leesburg, Tavares, the Villages, Claremont , and Inverness. I got through to the panel of jurors. Maybe eight people but the Judge removed me for being me being very short with my answers. It would have taken a very long time to go into detail. The case was a Hispanic police officer who wanted to write his reports in Spanish as well as English. Or maybe just in Spanish. His fellow Claremont police officers harassed him so he sued the town and its police department. The judge and jury held for the police department but the judge scolded the police officers for their behavior. Lots of police seemed to be there when I was.

The pay was minimal as was the gas reimbursement. I did get paid for the day and for the drive there and back. The Jury Summons had us arriving around 8 or maybe 8:30 AM.


No phones nor computers were allowed in the building.


The case was covered by some newspapers.


I saw Avatar in some kind of special theater at the Hollywood 16 that day .


I do not recall if the judge asked if there were any people in the jury pool with law degrees. That usually gets me bumped off any jury as I am U of MN Law School Class of 1989.

$50/day.

67¢/mile.

No very profitable work.

I did not know how to explain to the judge, various attorneys, fellow jurors, potential jurors and the others in the Courtroom my 224 613 Project. Thus the short answers. Now I just e-mail the Clerk of the Court when I get Jury Summons. The Judge in Sonoma County California for that Jury Summons seemed to know who I was. This was back around 1994. I have received several Sumter County Jury Summons over the 20 years when have lived here in the Villages. With Pinellas County they asked if anyone had legal training or worked in the legal system while we were in a common room. Sent everyone who said yes by raising a hand --out the door!

The law library in the Pinellas County Criminal Court building or whatever the proper title is had next to nothing available for survivors/victims of crimes looking for information about their rights and responsibilities. I had been looking in libraries of all kinds since late February 1976 when I was hoping to find something to help my fellow Earl Wooster High School students deal with the 2-24-1976 murder investigation involving the death of Michelle Mitchell who was one of the daughters of our English teacher. Michelle was a nursing student who attended the University of Nevada, Reno . 2-24 is also my birthday. I found very little at the huge U of Minnesota Law Library unless you asked the reference librarian to help you find it . They finally got the right person in the 2-24-1976 killing of Michelle Mitchell in 2014 due to a DNA test on a cigarette butt in the person of Rodney Halbower. Halbower is a serial murderer and rapist.

613 is the number I had in a 17 week study on stress in the unemployed conducted by the University of California San Francisco Health Science Campus in late 1992-1993. I had told my interviewer a lot about my experiences pushing for better materials accessible in libraries for survivors/victims of crimes. She did say my ideas were worthwhile but waited until I was done with the study to say anything.


Now though there is a lot online.

Few years ago received a questionnaire, filled it out and never heard anything further.

Would have liked to serve but spending the day without my cell would have given me second thoughts

I do remember sitting between two very attractive women. It did upset me when the Judge challenged me as a Juror because I was giving very limited answers. And one of the other jurors was fascinating and it would have been very interesting to talk with him even if he probably could not have said much given the kind of workers he supervised.

Has anybody ever served Federal Jury Duty while living in The Villages?

No, but if "U.S. Marshall Alvarez" calls and tells you that you failed to appear for duty and there is a bench warrant out for your arrest, it's a scam.

It seems like there was another Villager up in Ocala on that jury. He/she might have been booted like me though as they were still not quite done when I left . They were almost done though. They did have a Jury Foreman.


I was in a pool of jurors down in Bushnell years ago. This was for Sumter County. The defendant finally was convinced to plead guilty for vehicular manslaughter after about three hours of talks between the attorneys. The judge said that the trial would have been about six weeks .


We never got to questions for the potential jurors. There were a number of Villagers there.


We did get paid for the trip there and back and for a half day.

Happy to be on a jury for a short period but for a 6 week trial would find more excuses not to serve than Carter has pills.

it's summer ... turn the thermostat to 80, and go have a good time on the Feds!

I usually get off for bring an RN !

Medical, court background, and a gun permit, a solid NO, you are excused, for 3 Federal cases.

And if I had been on that jury I would have just listened and said as little as possible. I probably would have been voting against the cop who wanted to write his reports in Spanish only if that was the case. If he could have done it in both languages more power to him. Access to the legal system is important.


I am referring to the 2009 Federal case in which the Claremont Hispanic police officer was writing his reports in Spanish and being harassed because of it. They might have been in English and Spanish.

If this was the 6 weeks long case would have told them the defendant was guilty and I believed in death penalty. Thought should get me off pretty quickly.