Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Ah Balls... Rickey has Jury Duty

For reasons we can’t quite fathom, Rickey has been summoned to appear in court and is now snarled in the Byzantine process that is jury duty. The good news is that he was not selected for a three week criminal case involving charges of Murder in the First Degree. Whew. This may have been partially due to the fact that when asked if any of Rickey’s friends were lawyers, he responded truthfully: “yes, literally all of them.”

How did this help Rickey evade selection? Well, generally speaking, attorneys are looking for jurors who are completely ignorant of the law, and the last thing an attorney wants is a juror who knows the law or, even worse, thinks he or she knows the law. Also, people with "morals" are highly valued on a jury panel. So essentially, if you’re either dumb or churchy, you’re going to get selected. Because attorneys are looking for people who are easily manipulated, if they see that they are much smarter than you, you are in some deep shit.

So thankfully, Rickey wasn’t selected. This is fantastic news for you folks because given the nature of the case, Rickey’s jury stint most likely would have involved him being sequestered, and this turn of events would have deprived you of posts for an undetermined amount of time.

The bad news is that Rickey has instead been selected to serve on a civil case and most likely will not be blogging for the duration of the week. This turn of events is most likely penance for the severe punishment Rickey unleashed on his liver this past weekend. Now, yes, Rickey had inquired, and for some odd reason, the practice of “live blogging” from a court room is kind of verboten. Ah well.

Here’s to hoping for a civil trial brimming with frivolity, and overseen by a judge with an awesome nickname such as “the peacemaker” or “the hammer.” And yes, Rickey’s still weighing the pros and cons of wearing a British Parliamentary wig to the proceedings. Musings on just how “well-hung” a jury would be with Rickey serving on it should be left in the comments section below. Hint, the answer is “exceedingly.”

And if you ever get called for jury duty and don’t want to serve, Rickey strongly recommends taking a page from that episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” by stating: "Your honor, I do not believe I can be impartial, the man is a negro." Thanks very much Larry David. Now THAT’S how you get out of jury duty. Well, that, or:

1) being explosively and uncontrollably incontinent.
2) pretending you are mute.
3) pretending you don’t speak English.
4) claiming to enjoy the comedy stylings of Carlos Mencia.
5) pissing yourself.
6) sticking your hand down your pants.
7) carrying around a picture of your penis.

You know, whatever works best for you. Of course doing some of these might cause you to perjure yourself or be in contempt of court, which for all you non-legal scholars means roughly that the court will then proceed to seriously fuck you up. Fair warning. Anyway, Rickey will hopefully be checking back in with you folks in a few.

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6 comments:

Noah said...

It is Smitty's experience that civil trials are much worse than the criminal trials. Criminal trials usually involve some poor sap with a public defender up against a mountain of "evidence" (note the air quotes) and a voracious junior prosecutor. They're done in a day or two after the public defender pleads.

Civil trials, though, last forever and scrape over every single detail whilst both attorneys are dragging their feet, bilking their clients of more and more money and increasing the total payout of the trial so they get a bigger and bigger cut. Expect this to go on for a month.

Good luck.

Rickey said...

Shit, really? This is very not good news...

TheJackSack said...

Bring a flask, that's my suggestion.

Anonymous said...

Egan is no longer allowed on jury duty. There was an incident...

Egan, out.

AmyV said...

The last time I was called for jury duty, I almost missed it (totally forgot! my boss was the one who reminded me. how embarrassing!), then got selected for a jury in the afternoon.

After sitting for nearly an hour in a jury room with my fellow jurors - two of whom were complaining bitterly about having been chosen and about how everything at work was going to completely fall apart without them (btw, all the other jurors, myself included, were ready to smack them silly) - we got called into the courtroom and told the case had been settled and we could go home and were now excused for the next however many years of JD.

Woo-hoo!

Mr Furious said...

Never, EVER been called. Not sure how the selections are made, but I've been lucky.
Always had a driver's license, registered to vote, etc.

Mrs. Furious was called while pregnant with our first daughter (five years ago), got out of it, but they have called her faithfully every year since. She got out of it every time by being a breastfeeding mom, and eventually pregnant again. Each time they inform her they'll keep trying until she serves...

The call should come again next month, and she'll be breastfeeding our 8-month old.

That's how you get out of jury duty...
Don't think you could work that excuse, Rickey. But trying it might get you off for mental incapacity...