I like to be on time, but the court seem to have built in a significant amount of time for people who aren’t. Roll call on day two wasn’t for 20 minutes after the set time. Men are overwhelmingly worse at arriving on time. Day one started with a insanely banal 30 minute Important Video with Ed Bradley! and Dianne Sawyer! filmed at least 10 years ago. I remembered this video from my third-previous jury call, probably 1995 or 96, the one where I read all 576 pages of Hesse’s Magister Ludi: The Glass Bead Game and was dismissed from a jury because I thought I’d met the defendant’s husband at a gallery opening in Orange County sometime around 1990. That was also the time I got to spend all of my wait time in a room at 60 Centre St., which is a far more inspired and inspiring building than the utilitarian box-world of 110 Centre St. 60 Centre is the building where they film Law & Order’s courtroom scenes.
The best day to be called seems to be Thursday. I’ve lucked into a Thursday call my last two summonses. Nothing ever seems to happen on Fridays and twice they’ve let the entire pool go home after two days. There were somewhere around four jury pools called on Thursday, none on Friday. We all sat around until 12:50pm, at which point they let everyone go with credit for two full days served and at least two years before our next summons.
If at all possible, get a seat in the main room. In the side rooms, you need to stand and go to the door every time there’s a call. In the main room, all I needed to do was take out my earphones for a minute whenever they spoke on the microphone. Far less disruptive. There were plugs along the wall, I was on time so I grabbed one up front.
The bathrooms are unpleasant, so I tried to drink as little as possible. One very strong coffee with sugar on my way out of the house held me until lunch. Chinatown is right behind the courts, and it would be a shame to eat anywhere else when that close. On Thursday I went to my favorite hole-in-the-ground Vietnamese place (it’s in a basement) for a light curry over rice, shrimp summer rolls and a Cafe su da (the strongest, best iced coffee I’ve ever had). All were excellent, I skipped the Phö because I was trying to keep liquid intake at a minimum.
When leaving the courthouse, always take the stairs if you are able. The elevators are overcrowded and slow. I’m fast, but without trying I made it down three floors before the elevator had finished loading (there’s a tv monitor showing elevator locations).
Don’t bring a cellphone with a camera. Security will make you check it at the front desk and the line to retrieve those phones looked to be a longer wait than my subway ride and walk home. I heard people complaining about the camera ban (people are always complaining, especially at jury duty), but that rule was in place long before cell phones had cameras.
