Grand Jury Duty

[waverly]

Will I be excused because I have 2 youngish kids 6 and 8. They are in school but by the time I get them in the bus and make it the hour to 1.5 hour drive to the courthouse I wouldn’t get there in time. Same with the commute home. I don’t know if they go until 5, but if they do I wouldn’t be back in time to pick them up from aftercare. I won’t put them also in before care since 1 day of that led to extreme exhaustion and behavior problems for DS. DH travels for work and I have no family to watch them. Thoughts?

Kind of freaking out that the court will make me put them in before care and pick them up late or switch to a daycare center for 6 weeks. Also the 1-1.5 hour commute one way is brutal.

[tacokick]

It’s really up to the judge. It isn’t convenient for basically anyone so they don’t always take personal issues into consideration unless you are an extreme case. You have a spouse so probably wouldn’t qualify for a single parent exception.

[mommyatty]

It depends on your jurisdiction. Look in the court’s website for exemptions. In my jurisdiction, if you are solely in charge of caring for a child or elderly person, there’s an exemption for you. You would qualify. But not all jurisdictions have that option.

[k3am]

Based on my experience with jury duty... nope, you don’t qualify.

Like the PP said, jury duty is an inconvenience to everyone.

If you really want out of it, I suggest you’re either very pro NRA, or you get nervous and sometimes poop yourself. Both excuses worked during my 10 days of jury selection for a murder trial (not grand jury, but 3 month expected trial). Also your dad is a judge, your brother is a cop, or you don’t speak English. But those last three, you’ll need proof for.

[waverly]

Exemptions for can’t get childcare and primary caretaker. Someone said she wrote a letter to see if she could be switched to a closer court. I don’t know if she was selected. I could serve if I could get the closer court which is a 20 minute drive as opposed to 1.5 hours (with traffic and parking). They say I need to provide appropriate documentation. What sort of documentation do I provide to show that the commute would be outside of childcare hours? Just use school hours?

[erbear]

Mar 8, 2019 20:46:58 GMT -5 tacokick said:

It’s really up to the judge. It isn’t convenient for basically anyone so they don’t always take personal issues into consideration unless you are an extreme case. You have a spouse so probably wouldn’t qualify for a single parent exception.

Yup. I have never been excused from JD because I'm a mom. Tons of people are parents. There's a way - it might be inconvenient but you can do it. I've only been excused in the summer when I am full time child care.

[waverly]

I mean I can do it for 2-3 days but Grand Jury can be 6 weeks or months. I can’t really put my kids in childcare from 7 am to 6:30pm (have to switch daycare) for months. They would be exhausted. I would be exhausted from battling traffic. I know I sound like a wuss I’m just not good with traffic for hours.

I can get them on the bus and arrive at a closer court by 8:45 or do 15 minutes of before care.

It doesn’t help in typical DH attitude has said he won’t help me with childcare at all if I have a Jury Duty and makes fun of my concerns to be able to both get to court on time and pick them up before aftercare closes. And tells me that I should just ask the neighbors. Sure, again one time they can help me, but not your entire parenting job you’ve offloaded into me forever and now am trying to offload on them.

[orval]

Does your grand jury meet everyday? It may be only once a week for the six weeks or months or whatever.

[rere]

I tried that a few years ago. I worked part time and did not have a babysitter some days. He pretty much said tough, you need to figure it out and report when told.

[186momx]

DD teacher got selected for a grand jury estimated for 2 months. They only would meet every Wednesday. She said she was a teacher and that not only would it be difficult for her two small children but that she has a class of 25 2nd graders who would also be affected by having a multiple subs. She was put as an alternate.

If you can show map quest for drive time to the court and from along with daycare hours and how you are the sole caregiver during the week because your spouse is OOT you may be lucky and get moved to a closer court or can you reschedule to a later date that could work better with schedules like summer and have the kids go to Grandma's for part of it and have DH take vacation for another part?

[erbear]

Mar 8, 2019 23:48:24 GMT -5 waverly said:

I mean I can do it for 2-3 days but Grand Jury can be 6 weeks or months. I can’t really put my kids in childcare from 7 am to 6:30pm (have to switch daycare) for months. They would be exhausted. I would be exhausted from battling traffic. I know I sound like a wuss I’m just not good with traffic for hours.

I can get them on the bus and arrive at a closer court by 8:45 or do 15 minutes of before care.

It doesn’t help in typical DH attitude has said he won’t help me with childcare at all if I have a Jury Duty and makes fun of my concerns to be able to both get to court on time and pick them up before aftercare closes. And tells me that I should just ask the neighbors. Sure, again one time they can help me, but not your entire parenting job you’ve offloaded into me forever and now am trying to offload on them.

You have a husband problem. That sucks and I'm sorry you can't count on him. I'd ask to move because you're a solo parent.

[tacokick]

Mar 8, 2019 23:33:29 GMT -5 waverly said:

Exemptions for can’t get childcare and primary caretaker. Someone said she wrote a letter to see if she could be switched to a closer court. I don’t know if she was selected. I could serve if I could get the closer court which is a 20 minute drive as opposed to 1.5 hours (with traffic and parking). They say I need to provide appropriate documentation. What sort of documentation do I provide to show that the commute would be outside of childcare hours? Just use school hours?

School hours plus documentation of why your husband can’t take care of the children either; is he deployed, is his work week spent 100% in another city etc.


Normally grand jury duty is only 1-2 days a week for a few months, not daily for a few months.

[waverly]

Mar 9, 2019 14:20:53 GMT -5 erbear said:

Mar 8, 2019 23:48:24 GMT -5 waverly said:

I mean I can do it for 2-3 days but Grand Jury can be 6 weeks or months. I can’t really put my kids in childcare from 7 am to 6:30pm (have to switch daycare) for months. They would be exhausted. I would be exhausted from battling traffic. I know I sound like a wuss I’m just not good with traffic for hours.

I can get them on the bus and arrive at a closer court by 8:45 or do 15 minutes of before care.

It doesn’t help in typical DH attitude has said he won’t help me with childcare at all if I have a Jury Duty and makes fun of my concerns to be able to both get to court on time and pick them up before aftercare closes. And tells me that I should just ask the neighbors. Sure, again one time they can help me, but not your entire parenting job you’ve offloaded into me forever and now am trying to offload on them.

You have a husband problem. That sucks and I'm sorry you can't count on him. I'd ask to move because you're a solo parent.

He definitely has his moments. He’s been called 3 times and never been selected, so I think he thinks I won’t get picked and am worrying about nothing. And I’m over here worst case scenario. It does make me feel better that if picked it wouldn’t be 5 days a week for months like I was originally thinking.

[tacokick]

Mar 10, 2019 9:20:12 GMT -5 waverly said:

Mar 9, 2019 14:20:53 GMT -5 erbear said:

You have a husband problem. That sucks and I'm sorry you can't count on him. I'd ask to move because you're a solo parent.

He definitely has his moments. He’s been called 3 times and never been selected, so I think he thinks I won’t get picked and am worrying about nothing. And I’m over here worst case scenario. It does make me feel better that if picked it wouldn’t be 5 days a week for months like I was originally thinking.

He’s been called that much for a grand jury? That’s really unusual.

[waverly]

Mar 10, 2019 9:39:03 GMT -5 tacokick said:

Mar 10, 2019 9:20:12 GMT -5 waverly said:

He definitely has his moments. He’s been called 3 times and never been selected, so I think he thinks I won’t get picked and am worrying about nothing. And I’m over here worst case scenario. It does make me feel better that if picked it wouldn’t be 5 days a week for months like I was originally thinking.

He’s been called that much for a grand jury? That’s really unusual.

No, for regular jury duty.

[tacokick]

Mar 10, 2019 9:56:25 GMT -5 waverly said:

Mar 10, 2019 9:39:03 GMT -5 tacokick said:

He’s been called that much for a grand jury? That’s really unusual.

No, for regular jury duty.

Grand jury duty is a whole other ballgame. He should realize that!

[2chatter]

Here they don’t honor the exemptions for primary caregiver at all. I had a similar traffic/kid issue and they denied my request and the appeal to my request. I had to reschedule for work travel.

I will say that third time was a charm - I had a sick child and didn’t appear so they rescheduled me. The rescheduled date was on a school holiday. Otherwise I would have had to appear.

Don’t focus on the big picture. Focus on getting there one day for selection. Then cross that bridge. It helps me to not worry about things that aren’t happening yet.

[mustardseed2007]

Actually here we do have an exemption for primary caregiver, but it's printed on the form that you can mail in. It is actually worded in such a way that a working parent can definitely fill it out and get out of jury duty.

I have never been sent a summons for grand jury and I don't know what that looks like.

Sorry it's a pain. FWIW my DH is never sympathetic to me either. He works for a court and always tells me how it's my duty to go, especially since I'm a lawyer. And I mean...I guess he's not wrong but literally no sympathy.

[waverly]

It is listed on the website as possible, but it sounds like from talking to people in the area it is very much case by case which makes me think judge by judge.

They won't allow me to mail anything in maybe because it is Grand Jury or their policy. I have to show up in person. It is settling in my brain now, so I am less freaked out.

[k3am]

Mar 11, 2019 9:27:58 GMT -5 mustardseed2007 said:

Actually here we do have an exemption for primary caregiver, but it's printed on the form that you can mail in. It is actually worded in such a way that a working parent can definitely fill it out and get out of jury duty.

I have never been sent a summons for grand jury and I don't know what that looks like.

Sorry it's a pain. FWIW my DH is never sympathetic to me either. He works for a court and always tells me how it's my duty to go, especially since I'm a lawyer. And I mean...I guess he's not wrong but literally no sympathy.

They should also have an exemption for lawyers. At least here, they always send the lawyers home once they state their career.

[covergirl82]

I've never had to go for jury duty on a grand jury. Is it similar to regular jury duty, where you show up with 100 other people, and some are dismissed before even being seated on a panel for questioning? If that is the case, I would have a plan, but I've been called for jury duty 5 times in almost as many years (all when the kids were babies to preschool) - and yes, they figured out there was a glitch in the system and the same people were being sent summons over and over again and once they fixed it, I haven't been summoned since - and only was seating a panel for questioning once. I think I had to report three times and the other two I didn't need to go in.

While not a grand jury, I was seated on a jury panel for jury selection/questioning back when DS was 4 and DD was 2.5. We had a vacation planned for the following week, when the trial would've been. I mentioned it when they got to me, but the judge said it wasn't a good enough reason to excuse me. The defense attorney ended up dismissing one potential juror who had mentioned a vacation that overlapped with the trial (this was in July), and the prosecutor took pity on me and dismissed me the next time she had her turn to dismiss potential jurors.

Here in MI, for county court, DH's aunt was able to get out of jury duty because she is the primary caregiver for her grandkids two days a week, so I would see if you could still pursue that option.

[tacokick]

Mar 11, 2019 14:28:14 GMT -5 covergirl82 said:

I've never had to go for jury duty on a grand jury. Is it similar to regular jury duty, where you show up with 100 other people, and some are dismissed before even being seated on a panel for questioning? If that is the case, I would have a plan, but I've been called for jury duty 5 times in almost as many years (all when the kids were babies to preschool) - and yes, they figured out there was a glitch in the system and the same people were being sent summons over and over again and once they fixed it, I haven't been summoned since - and only was seating a panel for questioning once. I think I had to report three times and the other two I didn't need to go in.

While not a grand jury, I was seated on a jury panel for jury selection/questioning back when DS was 4 and DD was 2.5. We had a vacation planned for the following week, when the trial would've been. I mentioned it when they got to me, but the judge said it wasn't a good enough reason to excuse me. The defense attorney ended up dismissing one potential juror who had mentioned a vacation that overlapped with the trial (this was in July), and the prosecutor took pity on me and dismissed me the next time she had her turn to dismiss potential jurors.

Here in MI, for county court, DH's aunt was able to get out of jury duty because she is the primary caregiver for her grandkids two days a week, so I would see if you could still pursue that option.

Grand jury duty is very different from trial jury duty. They don’t bring in as many people, it’s much harder to get out of, much bigger commitment, different responsibilities . But once you do it, you are normally exempt for a long time.

[waverly]

I’m writing up my info so I can say I tried, but expecting to serve.

Talked to my childcare and they said whatever I need. I expect there will be pushback if I have to pick them up an hour late, but so far they seemed ok if I get out of court at 6 and don’t pick them up until 7. The website says I could stay until 6 if picked. They close at 6, so not sure how they want to handle it. I think it would likely only be that first day there until 6. The rest should be 5.

I am checking traffic everyday so far it is 45 minutes then add the 15 for parking, walking and security. So hopefully in the hour range. My friend said it took 3 hours once in snow so at least April won’t be snow.

[mustardseed2007]

Mar 11, 2019 13:53:36 GMT -5 k3am said:

Mar 11, 2019 9:27:58 GMT -5 mustardseed2007 said:

Actually here we do have an exemption for primary caregiver, but it's printed on the form that you can mail in. It is actually worded in such a way that a working parent can definitely fill it out and get out of jury duty.

I have never been sent a summons for grand jury and I don't know what that looks like.

Sorry it's a pain. FWIW my DH is never sympathetic to me either. He works for a court and always tells me how it's my duty to go, especially since I'm a lawyer. And I mean...I guess he's not wrong but literally no sympathy.

They should also have an exemption for lawyers. At least here, they always send the lawyers home once they state their career.

Oh definitely not an automatic out. The judge my husband works for got picked for a jury while he was a sitting federal judge. 

That's irony. 

[mommyatty]

My husband used to work in Probation, doing presentence investigations. His boss, who ran the whole Probation program, got picked for a criminal jury. I almost got picked once except the court didn’t pick a big enough pool so there weren’t enough of us standing at the end of voir dire.

[notoriousmeg]

I had grand jury duty once per week for 12 weeks. There were zero exemptions and I am only good for 3 years, but I got out by 4 every day so I could pick up DS if needed. It sucked the 2 days he was sick. Hood luck!