Jury duty notes

The day before jury duty.
Tomorrow I have jury duty, and I am looking forward to it.

Last time I served, I made it as far as walking into a court room.  I never had to answer any questions from the judge or a lawyer.  So basically, I just sat around, read and waited.  Needless to say, I loved it.  It was like retirement.

This time, I plan to take a book, a computer, a tablet and my phone.  This should give me enough things to read as I wait around.

Day 1 of jury duty.
I arrived a bit before 9 am.  I went through security, got to the floor I have been assigned to, and waited until the doors were opened.

When we were allowed in, we found a seat, watched a video, filled out some forms and waited again.  At first, I was a bit disappointed that I didn't get a seat near a power outlet.  But I soon found a computer room where I could sit and plug in.  I would think that a spot at one of the desks would be in higher demand, but there were a few remaining spots.

Around 10:15 am, we were told that a judge wanted to see everyone at 2 pm in another building.  So we were free until then.  If we were told this the day before, I would have gone to work for half a day.

After lunch, I bought soup dumplings and ate in the park, I went to the other jury waiting room and waited.  Around 2:30 pm, we were all called to the court, where the judge told us that this trial could last over a month.  The judge asked for volunteers who could serve.  A few people volunteered, but the judge was looking for more.  She then asked a few people why they couldn't serve and she said some were ok and some were bad excuses.  After a few rounds, I eventually volunteered.

I definitely did not want to spend weeks coming to this court house.  I did not want the projects I was working on at work.  There was no good reason for me to excuse myself, but there were a lot of reasons for me to serve. Every citizen should be ready to serve their city/country if called upon.  I also thought to myself, if I postpone now, there is no guarantee that I will have more time in the future or get a shorter case later on.  My desire to not procrastinate and my civic duty led me to volunteer for a trial I had no desire to participate in.

After about 60 volunteers arose, the remaining jurors were sent out of the courtroom.  The judge made some remarks, and then names were called out and chosen to sit in the jury box or in a specific seat in the audience.  My name was not called out.  Each of the jurors who had their name called out answered a list of questions like, "where did they live", "what do they do", "do they know any policeman", etc ... After this line of questioning, all jurors were told to go home and report back to the court room the next day at 9:45 am.

Day 2 of jury duty.
I went to the court house and waited for the judge to call in all of the jurors.  This time, the lawyers did most of the talking and each set asked a bunch of questions.  Some were directed to the whole set of jurors, like "Does anyone have any issue with saying someone is not guilty if there isn't sufficient evidence" and some were asked direct questions like "Mr X, will you be able to judge impartially the merits of the case based only on the evidence presented in the court room?"

After a few hours, all jurors were sent out of the courtroom.  After about half an hour, the jurors who had their names called earlier (30 or so of them), were called back into the courtroom.  After a few minutes, several of them walked out.  Then, for all of the rest of us, we were told to go back to the jury waiting room -- we weren't going to sit on this trial.

Back in the jury waiting room, we were told to return in an hour, after lunch.  After lunch (this time I ate Mapo Tofu in the park) we waited for a bit and were then eventually released with papers saying that we served for two days.

Is circumstantial evidence enough?
One line of questioning by the defense to the prospective jurors made me think that I might not be able to serve.  The defense said that the evidence in this case was all circumstantial.  He asked if we could render a verdict using just circumstantial evidence.  The example he gave goes as follows:

If you pick up your mail (in your apartment building) today, and then return tomorrow and find mail there again, then it is reasonable to conclude that the mailman visited your apartment building. 

After a moment of thought, I thought of three ways mail could be in your mailbox without the mailman visiting.

1. When I picked up the mail, I left a letter behind.
2. A neighbor incorrectly got a letter addressed to me.  The neighbor put the letter into my mailbox or asked the doorman to put it into my mailbox.  
3. The doorman had only sorted some of the mail when I picked up the mail, and he finished putting the mail into the boxes after I made my first pick up. 

If asked, I don't think I could convict someone of a crime if all evidence was circumstantial.  Maybe it was a bad example, or I was thinking about it incorrectly.

Conclusions
My jury experience was a little bit better than the previous time.  With a power outlet, wifi, computer and a phone, I can always find something to read or play around with.  In the future, I hope the jury duty experience improves even more such that we don't have to physically go to the court house unless we are actually needed.