Andy Coulson's lucky break

Got a letter today, dated 8th July 2012. Forwarded from the house I lived in four years ago.

Oh right. Interesting.

I phone the Jury Summoning Service. Very nice lady answers. 'Hello', I say. 'A couple of problems. Firstly, you used an old address. Don't you get jurors from the electoral roll?' 'Well', she said, 'we get them from the local authority, and they don't bother updating most lists. What's your juror number?'

I tell her. 

'Oh, she said. You're not on our system. In fact, your juror number is associated with a lady named Marilyn'. 

'OK then', say I. 'Next problem. You're calling me for jury service 9 years ago. I did do jury service in 2003, and don't want to go back'. 

'That's a printer error', she said. 

Eh? Really?

So I'm not down to do jury service. Which is a shame, as I was really looking forward to sitting in judgement on Andy Coulson, Rebekah Brooks or Jack Straw in his surely upcoming trial for war crimes. 

Still, top quality work from the HM Courts and Tribunals Service. 

Twelve men good and true

What a public-spirited citizen - and he got away with it! Not that I'd want him on my jury.

I did jury service a few years ago. It felt like being inducted into to a lynch-mob. They all read the Daily Mail and kept saying things like 'he must have done it - he's in court' and 'he must be guilty because he doesn't look sorry' (the chap was pleading innocent and we'd seen him for all of five minutes before being sent out for legal argument. I didn't endear myself to my fellow jurors by affirming rather than swearing on a holy book, by reading the Guardian, and for pointing out that voting guilty on particular charges because he'd obviously done something wasn't really the point. I felt sorry for one guy though - he shared the bus ride home with the defendants every evening, which seemed a bit odd.

The trouble is, we worked hard as a jury, and the court officials, lawyers and police appeared not to have done so. Important questions weren't asked, important problems weren't raised, and the judge seemed to live in a different world - which is a problem. I don't mind a judge not knowing that Stella is known as 'wifebeater' or (in one defendant's words) 'loopy-juice', but you have to question the worldliness of a man who asks the defence 'What is this Stella?' ('a lager, m'lud') and follows it with 'and in what quantities does one consume this beverage?' (in pint glasses, m'lud).

Was justice done in the cases I sat on? Case one came to an 11-1 verdict of guilty. Guess who voted not guilty? I thought he had committed criminal acts, but that no evidence had been presented. We voted not guilty on the second case because we thought that he probably was guilty but that the prosecution and coppers could have done some fairly easy work to nail him, but didn't.

Anyone else been on (or in front of) a jury?