12 Angry Minnesotans

Most people in this country have seen the movie Twelve Angry Men. The premise is simple. What happens in the jury deliberation room of a murder trial? I personally have seen the movie several times. Recently I took some time off work to fulfill my own civic duty and answered a summons for jury duty. I was at the service of the Hennepin County Court system for 2 weeks; I even sat on a jury for a felony trial. While it was not a murder case it was a serious offense and a very taxing ordeal. And what happen in the jury room was very reminiscent of the above mentioned movie. It even had some similar characters. I found the whole experience emotional, a little unnerving, but over all reassuring about the system.

First I should talk about the boring part. The part of jury duty that is made fun of by many comedians and on countless sitcoms, waiting to be and being selected for a jury. It’s better in some ways then it used to be. For one I started and ended my service on a call in basis. I simply had to call a number and listen for my jury group number - if I wasn’t called I was free to do what ever I wanted. I had to call in twice a day and ended up not being called in until the second day and then I was again ok for the last 3 days of service the following week. Once called in however the process is pretty standard. You go to the court house, check in, and wait in a room until judge calls for a jury. There is an hour and ½ for lunch and you can leave for 5 minute breaks from time to time. However there is absolutely nothing to do. Most people read or play cards. There is no internet connection, cell phones don’t work, and there is no TV. So the day I spent in the selection pool was very, very long.

Once a judge calls for a jury the computer random selects up to 26 people, everyone is screened for weapons, and then we were led to the court room. Once in there everyone is given a quick orientation and then asked generic questions. No one was excused at this point. Then all but 2 people were brought the jury box and asked questions by the judge and only one person was excused at this point. Finally the attorneys asked questions of the jury and no one was excused for cause. After that the attorneys literally passed a she of paper back and forth and crossed off names until there were only 14 people left of the original 26; 12 jurors and 2 alternates. After the first day of the trial a final person was excused because she has a connection, though loose, to the case. So we were down to 13. The case was slow moving and took 3 days or so. The only surprise was how slow and procedural everything was. No nearly as fast moving or interesting as TV would have you believe. Finally the closing arguments were completed, the remaining alternate was excused, and it was time to deliberate.

We were not sequestered so we didn’t have to stay in a hotel or keep away from family or friends, though we were not allowed to speak about the case. This was a small point of contention between my GF and myself. She wanted to know more and I would tell her. When were at the court house we could not talk about the case except in the jury room and were escorted everywhere during the day. We ate together, went out to smoke together (well we watched the 2 smokers through a window), and took breaks together. We took more than a day to deliberate and it was interesting to see the mood of the group change from time to time. I was interesting I think that everyone probably felt that their own view was a slam dunk and were surprised when other’s disagreed. The general mood overall was civil and everyone was respectful and listened to everyone else’s views. In fact the behavior was amazing. The differing views in my opinion and the way people approached the process amazed me.

First of all while the deliberation reminded me of the Twelve Angry Men there was no Henry Fonda and no set of ‘hang em for it all no matter what’ jurors. And of course now women and people from different races are all part of process, compared to the 12 middle aged white men form the movie. However there were people I thought had racist views, and I thought a few people were willing to throw out the process in favor of their own version of justice. This scared me. A lot of the strength of this Country is built into its rule of law and due process. For people to be willing to go on gut feelings and ignore facts or lack of facts because the think someone is scum and needs to be punished frightens me. Luckily for me I did not have to put up the majority of the fight in this situation. We had two people that put up most the fight for process, assumption of innocence, and due process so I only needed to add a certain level of support.

At this time a little back ground on the case may help. The case involved two suburban white kids (the victims) with their two high school friends, and two slightly older black men crashing at a house in that suburb. The crimes revolved around a drug deal gone bad where the white kids were going to sell weed to the black men, and one of the black men robbed them. The trial was for only one of the black men, and he was not the main offender in this case. However in Minnesota you can be charged with the full crime if you aided, abetted, conspired or counseled someone in connection with that crime. So our defendant was charged with a crime his brother committed, with the DA asserting that he helped it happened and that it was planned.

The evidence consisted only of the testimony of the two white kids involved, the defendant, and a couple of police officers involved in the case. The stories were remarkably similar and left out a lot of the story. Because of this we did not have any real hard evidence for two of the crimes the defendant was being charged with and only slight better evidence with the third crime. Because of this the jury room was fraught with speculation and very creative story lines that could not be corroborated with evidence.

To start deliberations we first selected a foreman, a mid level manager for Gander Mountain or Dicks Sporting Goods. Then we each went around and summarized our thoughts. The first six people were already set on guilty on all charges. Then it came time for me to speak and I had to disagree with them on several points. The next person agreed with me, followed by two others that also wanted to go the all guilty route. Then we rounded with a man who disagreed with all the counts, a woman with serious doubts, and the final two really wanted (yes I say wanted) to find this man guilty of every thing. In fact the last four people to speak were the spear heads of both sides of the arguments that pursued for the rest of the time.

At this time we argued over and over about the definitions of the crimes, and then about the evidence presented. Just like in the movie some of the hard cases started to see the doubt other’s had. It was not proved that there was any plan or collusion to rob these kids so most of us could not find him guilt of two of the charges. Then we argued over the third charge and convinced the guy that didn’t see guilt anywhere that he was guilty of the third charge. Then we went to a set of lesser crimes and found him guilty of 1 case and not the other. However during this entire process the arguments continued to stray from the fact to the land of suppose. Suppose the defendant did this, suppose he did that. I think this type of debate hit its peak when the most adamant proponent for guilty literally slammed his fist down on the table. As if a theatrical gesture would change our minds. He also kept making distinctions of how these career criminals were taking advantage of these kids.

Come on the white kids were the drug dealers in this situation! The difference is that they were clean cut and white, not that they were less of criminals. Also how can you convict someone on evidence that doesn’t exist? This wasn’t the only case of what I think was racism coming into play. The foreman also made some similar comments but I think they were more guarded, less blatant, and I’m not sure he realized he was making decisions based on who these people were rather than what was proven to happen. Another problem I had was that one woman just couldn’t understand how it wasn’t an all or nothing decision. There were 5 possible crimes and we could find guilt or not guilty with any combination we wanted. She could not understand how the defendant could be guilty of robbing one person and not the other. Forget the fact that he only took things from one person while his counterpart took everything else. And forget that he received voluntarily before his counterpart committed the real crimes.

I did break at one point. Again the most racist (I think) and the most adamant person for guilty finally after most people were agreed with a verdict tried a last ditch effort to sway people back his way. He literally said “We need to consider the questions that were not asked and why they were not asked”. This is counter to all of the instructions the judge gave us and all of the material we were given to consider. I lost it for a second and yelled at him that we could under no circumstance do that, that it was specifically spelled out by the judge not to go there. That we could only consider the evidence presented and could not suppose beyond that. Circumstantial evidence is one thing. Making up a completed time line with out support is another.

So we finally did find the defendant guilt of one of the major charges and one of the minor charges, but we just did not have the evidence to convict on the more serious charges. I was happy to see that we came to this based on the assumption of innocence and thorough examination of the facts and evidence. The case really hinged on the lack of evidence and even if we thought he probably was guilty of more the DA had not proved it. I was very satisfied with this. I thought we behaved in a manor (at least at the end) I would want a jury considering a case against me would behave. Though I was a little emotionally drained by the day and half of arguing and the blatant racism and what seemed like vigilantism of some members of the jury. Now I know why there are so many people asked to decide something. You get a very thorough argument from many, many points of view.