If you’re reading this on Wednesday, there’s a chance I will be serving jury duty. A slight chance. A very, very, very slightest of the slight chances. There is a better chance of you tossing a handful of glitter in my face in the next 36 seconds than there is of me getting on a jury. There are a few experiences to which I have had access but not opportunity – for example, I’ve never petted a buffalo, despite being on a handful of buffalo farms with buffalo farmers who were able to get the buffalo up nice and close without them murdering me (PS, readers who have never been in proximity to buffalo: don’t get near them under any other circumstance than what I described above because they will murder you). Serving on a jury is another of life’s moments that continues to elude me.
Here’s why I can’t get on a jury: my husband is an attorney. He’s not a lawyer in the lawyer sense that we all think of lawyers – he’s a hockey agent, and most hockey agents are also lawyers because hockey agenting requires contract negotiations. He’s not a litigator. He doesn’t even practice in North Dakota. Kyle was in law school when we got engaged, and a judge told me, “If you want to get on a jury you’d better do it now because once he’s passed the bar and you’re married, you’re kaput.” The reason being that other attorneys would know that I know the secrets of the legal system and would therefore be able to discern if they were doing a good or bad job.
The rub is that the majority of what I know about lawyering has not come from Kyle, but from the fact that an uncomfortable number of my friends are lawyers, including my best friend in the world, who is an actual practicing attorney in multiple states and countries. I have so many friends (hard brag) who are lawyers that, sometimes, they will lawyer in opposition of one another. Two of my friends are judges, and not the judge I mentioned earlier, who is now retired. If you ever need a lawyer (or an architect or hockey coach, who are also people who see me and think, “Yep, I can deal with that”), I’m your girl.
It’s such a bummer that I can’t get on a jury because I know FOR A FACT that I would be awesome. I’m great at following directions; I don’t want anyone to go to jail or pay damages unless they are guilty beyond a reasonable doubt within the confines of the law; and I’ve seen over 100 episodes Law & Order. (That actually should be a question they ask in jury selection – right after “Do you know any of the individuals in this courtroom?” should be “Have you seen more than 100 episodes of Law & Order?”) I would sit myself in the front row and listen hard and nod my head and look at the exhibits. I would be such a bang-up juror that the legal system would say, “You know, we don’t really need a jury of our peers; we can do it with just Amanda from now on.”
Alas.
The reason why that judge told me to get on the jury back in my pre-married days is because I had been called for jury duty. I was 25 years old, and so I put on my best “I may be 25 years old in my face but I’m wise beyond my years, as you can see by this outfit” outfit of a khaki skirt and white button-up shirt and headed to a courthouse full of people who did not share the same outfit sentiment as me based on the quantity of ripped t-shirts and back-pocket chew rings in attendance.
I sat down next to an elderly woman, who was the only other person in the room not in denim. She was wearing a yellow pantsuit, and when I complimented her on the color she said, “This is my court suit; I’ve worn it on all twelve of the juries I’ve sat on.”
“Wow, TWELVE,” I said. “That must be some kind of record.”
“Oh, I doubt it,” she laughed – and then, “I’ve been the foreperson on nine.”
“I’d like to be the foreperson on this one,” I said.
“Is that right,” she said, without looking at me.
We were shuffled into the courtroom. Pantsuit and I sat next to each other in the front row.
If you haven’t had to yet sit through voir dire, it’s basically a competition between two attorneys to present the most overwrought, overemotional version of the case and see how the jurors respond. I don’t really want to tell you the details of the actual case because I see the individuals involved around town all the time – so, instead imagine a person had trespassed onto someone’s field in an attempt to pet a buffalo and had, instead, been murdered.
“You’re going to hear that my client acted with malice,” the buffalo’s attorney would say. “But nothing could be further from the truth. My client has the longest history of volunteerism within the animal community, including providing a point of respite for area robins and sheltering baby rabbits from the cold.” And the attorney would point to the buffalo, who would be sitting with his hooves crossed and his fur washed and fluffed, looking forlornly at the table while his mother wept behind him in a pillbox hat surrounded by equally-forlorn birds and bunnies.
Voir dire went for most of the day, with jurors getting picked off one by one based on things like their interest in veganism and their inability to describe more than 100 episodes of Law & Order. Pantsuit had sat quietly – outside of one tiny snort during the prosecution’s dramatics, perceptible only to me. I made it all the way to the final cut and was one of the last jurors released. Pantsuit stayed on.
I ran into the judge at a grad party a while later. The prosecution had hung their hat on the fact that their client was unable to attend medical school due to the acts of the defendant, and the judge told me I had been removed because the legal team assumed I would know the difference between a good and a bad MCAT (the test to get into medical school) score.
“I have no idea,” I told him. He shrugged.
“Did the prosecution win?” I asked. They had not.
“Who was the foreperson?” I asked.
“This little old lady,” the judge told me. “Interesting tidbit: she told me later that it was her thirteenth trial.”
“Is that right,” I said, without looking at him.
Obviously, I don’t have a photo of me attempting to serve jury duty, but I do have a picture of me NOT serving jury duty. It is above.
This week on North Dakota Today we talked about Sheila Capistran, my Nice Person of the Week, and some baby ducks. Enjoy. (Valley News Live)
I posted about a few more cool goings-on around the region this week: Lindaas Barn Dances and the Little Red Reading Bus. Click the underlined words in the last sentence to read more – and keep sending your events to me, friends! (North Dakota Nice)
I was lucky enough to see a double rainbow this week, too, although not as brilliant as this! (Facebook)
Teagan Erbele is Napoleon’s first-ever Presidential Scholar. (KX Net)
The Bismarck Public Schools Foundation has a new scholarship in honor of a former BPS Community Relations Director. (KFYR TV)
I love stories of perseverance – like this one about Codi Miller, who took a run at the Miss North Dakota U.S.A. crown 7 times before she won. (KX Net)
In “News that would make my 9-year-old blazingly jealous,” East Grand Forks’ Saylor Curran traveled the country with the Broadway production of “Annie.” (Grand Forks Herald)
Play ball! (Minot Daily News)
Kyle and his friends, Corey and Kelly, have a podcast called North Dakota After Dark where they talk about youth hockey in North Dakota. The latest episode is up and is an interview with Jason Marshall. Check it out. Bonus: you can watch it on YouTube. (North Dakota After Dark)
North Dakota Nice 
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