Jury Service

Was tempted to say something a little un PC then but refrained as I don’t want to be reading about myself in tomorrow’s Times
 
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Malevolence said:
Anyone got a screen grab of the full article?
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Rise in jury-dodging down to online chat, judge warns
Jonathan Ames, Legal Editor


July 23 2019, 12:01am, The Times

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Online chat rooms are fostering the view that people can produce standard reasons for avoiding jury serviceALAMY
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A senior judge has expressed exasperation with the excuses people make to avoid doing jury duty, blaming online culture for encouraging them.

Judge Andrew Menary, QC, the recorder of Liverpool, blamed online chat rooms for fostering the view among the public that they can produce standard reasons that will allow them to avoid doing their civic duty.

He expressed his frustration as he fined a man who refused to do jury duty the maximum penalty.

Barry Grimes, 70, was ordered to pay £1,000 for producing a string of unacceptable excuses for failing to attend Liverpool crown court. Grimes, from Bromborough in the Wirral, refused to serve as a juror and then failed to attend his contempt of court hearing, according to BBC News.

He failed to attend court for jury service that was initially scheduled for January last year. His service was deferred until this month, but again Grimes was absent.

He is understood to have told officials that he was incapable of sitting down for long periods and that he was unable to concentrate. However, when he was told that he would need to provide a valid medical certificate, Grimes said that he was generally unfit and would not attend.

On another occasion, Grimes said that the scheduled jury service conflicted with a holiday he had already booked, but the judge also rejected that excuse. In the judge’s view, Grimes “displayed a wholly unpleasant and unnecessary attitude” and his approach was “a quite deliberate contempt of court”.

Grimes has 28 days to pay the fine. If he fails, he could be jailed for 14 days.

Fining Grimes, the judge bemoaned a rising frequency he said he had seen in people ignoring jury summonses and refusing to sit.

He said that many people were turning to chat rooms for tips on dodging doing their duty.

One web chat room called OverclockersUK, and a Yahoo chat forum, for example, list tips for avoiding jury service.

Prospective jurors who feel that they should be let off the hook must contact the jury central summoning bureau for a deferral or to be excused entirely.

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