“Hey hey! Looky what I just got in the mail.” I shout to my commune mates. They act mildly interested as I say, “It’s a summons to jury duty. Looks like I’m going to be able to meat out some real justice. Unless they were violent then they’re innocent.”
Pat shakes her head saying, “Man Tai, you are totally deluded if you think they’re going to let you decide some case. I mean just look at you. Long hair, beard, tie dyed clothes and you look stoned to the tits.” She takes a toke, hands me the joint saying, “Yeah right, they’ll choose you all right.”
I take a hit then say, “Hey, they got to take me. After all, I am an upstanding citizen whose never been arrested and besides, it’s my civic duty.”
I pass the doobie to Joanne who laughs and says, “Tai, the straights ain’t going to want you but go ahead and waste your time if you want. We’ll just stay here and get high”
After finishing the joint I walk down to Mission St. and catch the MUNI to the San Francisco City and Municipal Courthouse. I walk in, check the directory and find out where the Court Clerks office then stroll on over. As soon as I walk in the door one of the clerks see me. He get up and walks over to the counter looks me up and down then asks, “And what can I do for you?”
I hand him my summons and proudly say, “I just got this today and am here to report for jury duty.”
He takes the paper, glances at it, looks at me again then shakes his head saying, “Don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of this. You’re excused.” and starts to walk away.
I call him back saying, “Hey, I don’t want to be excused. I want to serve on a jury and see some justice done.”
The clerk turns back to me and says, “Look, I can’t tell you not to try and get on a jury but I can tell you that even if a defense lawyer picked you there’s no way any DA would let you sit on a jury. So if you want to come down here for the next two week and sit around in the jury room from 8:30 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. for $5 a day then be my guest.”
I’m get incensed so I say, “That’s discrimination! What about my constitutional right to…”
The clerk interrupts me saying, “Look, you want me to take care of this or you want to come down here and sit on your ass for the next two weeks. I don’t care and I don’t have time for this. So what’s it going to be?”
I stop my rant, smile at the guy and say, “Well, I guess I’ll just be moseying along.”
He nods saying, “Wise choice. Now get out of here”
When I get home I’ll tell everyone about being discriminated against and how unfair our justice system really is. They just shake their heads and look at me like I’m some kind of moron then Pat says, ”I don’t know why you even waste your time. You know the straights don’t like us.”
I look back at her saying, “I don’t know why either but sometimes I just have to try.”