What I Learned While Serving On The Grand Jury

Last month I shared my excitement and renewed civic commitment after being called for jury duty and selected for a month-long term as a Clackamas County Grand Juror. Here are some insights I’ve gained through what has become one of the most profound experiences of my life.

I can’t reveal most of what happened. Our very first instruction was that everything that occurred in the Grand Jury room was to be kept secret, not only for the duration of our term as Grand Jurors, but also for the rest of our lives.

“The press may try to get you to talk about specific cases,” said the judge. “If that happens, you can refer them to me.” That brought up an interesting question for me, because technically I’m part of the press. I asked whether it represented a problem.

“Will you have a problem keeping the proceedings secret?” he demanded.

“Not at all, your honor,” I replied earnestly.

“Then there’s no problem,” he decreed.

We had been selected at random from the jury pool, except for an automatic sort of self-selection process; we had been among the 25% who were unwilling or unable to present an acceptable reason for being excused. As such, it was probable that none of us would have had any background in law or particular experience serving on a jury.

A deputy district attorney had to spend an hour or so orienting us to our new task.

“Forget everything you’ve ever seen on TV about juries,” he said. “You won’t be in a courtroom, and there won’t be a judge present. And you’ll only hear one side of the case. This isn’t about deciding the guilt or innocence of the defendant—only whether there’s enough evidence even to bring him to trial, where he can present his defense. The regular jury will decide either for or against.”

He was right. It wasn’t anything like Perry Mason or Twelve Angry Men— more like an all-day committee meeting, every week day for a month, but fascinating, absorbing, vital. After the first day, I had to go home and look up the history of Grand Juries on the internet.

I had been under the impression that it was called the Grand Jury because it handled only big important cases. Not so. Originally the Grand Jury consisted of 24 or 25 knights of the realm in England and was called “Grand” simply because it was bigger than the Petit Jury of 12 people.

And its original purpose was to serve the king in rooting out and accusing criminals. Gradually its purpose changed in law, however, so that by the time of King Charles the grand jury had become an institution “capable of being a real safeguard for the liberties of the subject.” In the American colonies, this theory was eventually embodied in the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Some have criticized the grand jury system as simply being a rubber stamp for the prosecution and in many jurisdictions grand juries have been abolished and replaced with preliminary hearings.

Others argue that they act as a buffer between potential defendants and prosecutors who might bring spurious charges against innocent citizens—and that grand juries help keep the courts from being clogged with endless preliminary hearings.

We were presented only with felony charges, and prevented from knowing anything about the prospective defendant’s prior record. If any one of us was acquainted with any of the principals of the case, that juror had to remove himself from the deliberation. A majority vote of five out of the seven of us was required in order to call the charge a “true bill;” that is, to issue an indictment and send the case to trial.

After the first day, we began to suspect the “rubber-stamp” charge had merit, since we were voting “true bill” on virtually every case. We talked it over amongst ourselves, though, and came to realize that the District Attorney’s office rightfully would not submit charges they knew would be rejected. We did, in fact, vote “not true bill” on a number of cases we thought did not have enough evidence to go to trial.

The things I learned would fill a book—and may, someday. I’ll confine myself to three discoveries that astounded me. The first was appalling, though I had considered myself somewhat cynical and unable to be surprised in this area. That was the degree to which methamphetamine contributed to the crime rate all over the county.

Honestly, if there were way to magically eliminate meth, domestic violence, and identity theft charges from the justice system, the grand jury could meet for half a day a week. And most of those cases were woven together in a spider-web network of complexity that was overwhelming.

The second was the quality of commitment, awareness, and sincerity each individual juror brought to the task. If asked ahead of time, I would have predicted that at least one of the group, and probably two or three, would have been an idiot, a bigot, or fanatic of some kind. But without exception I found our panel to be dedicated, level-headed citizens committed to safeguarding the public from dangerous criminals, while protecting the constitutional rights of alleged perpetrators, and showing sympathy for innocent victims.

And finally, I was very favorably impressed by the sincerity and dedication of the deputy district attorneys who were charged with bringing cases before us. This cynical old reporter was fully prepared to encounter at least a few fast-talking, roughshod, slick-operating ramrods, but if that’s what I had been looking for I would have been intensely disappointed.

We dealt with at least two dozen different deputy D.A.’s, several of them at some length over the course of a month, every week day, 8:30-5:00. There’s not one that I wouldn’t trust with my family, my life, my fortune, and my sacred honor. Some demonstrated such passionate commitment to the fair and equitable application of justice, and such deep sympathy for victims, that many of us on the panel were moved to tears.

If that’s rubber-stamping or whitewashing, make the most of it.