Juror given indefinite jury duty after she makes racist remarks on questionnaire

[HowToBe]

Happened across this old news (2011):

_http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/judge-juror-799-indefinite-jury-duty-racist-remarks-questionnaire-article-1.109741

An incensed federal judge sentenced a racist Brooklyn woman to indefinite jury duty on Tuesday after she trashed the NYPD and minorities.

"This is an outrage, and so are you!" Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis told the woman, holding up her bile-filled juror questionnaire.

Juror No. 799, an Asian woman in her 20s who said she works in the garment industry, was up for jury duty in the death penalty trial of Bonanno crime boss Vincent (Vinny Gorgeous) Basciano.

It didn't take long for her to start looking worse than the defendant.

Asked to name three people she least admired, she wrote on her questionnaire: "African-Americans, Hispanics and Haitians."

When the judge asked why she answered the question that way, she replied, "You always hear about them in the news doing something."

She also declared that cops are all lazy, claiming that they sound their sirens to bypass traffic jams.

Garaufis flipped forward several pages in her questionnaire.

He landed on the page where she had said she had a relative who was a member of the Chinese Ghost Shadows gang in the 1980s, convicted of murder and still in prison.

[...]

It was unclear Tuesday whether that was this woman's motive.

And if it was, it didn't work.

Indeed, the woman was going to be seeing a lot of Brooklyn Federal Court.

"She's coming back [today], Thursday and Friday - and until the future, when I am ready to dismiss her," Garaufis said.

Doesn't that pretty much throw the "fairness" rhetoric about a jury out the window? Someone claims to be a flaming racist and bigot, so you assign them to help determine the outcome of multiple court cases? For that matter, does she not have the right to "a jury of her peers" to decide whether this "sentence" is appropriate?

Weird.

 

[truth seeker]

Doesn't that pretty much throw the "fairness" rhetoric about a jury out the window? Someone claims to be a flaming racist and bigot, so you assign them to help determine the outcome of multiple court cases? For that matter, does she not have the right to "a jury of her peers" to decide whether this "sentence" is appropriate?

My current understanding is that many people fill out the questionnaire with the intention of appearing biased - so they can avoid being picked and having to serve. Not that, that makes it right, but perhaps that's one reason why Garaufis came up with the sentence he did?

 

[hlat]

A couple of points. Judges do break the law and rules, and the real question is whether they are caught and punished. Media stories about legal cases often omit or do not understand key legal points. What was the legal basis for holding the juror? Contempt of court?

 

[Ben]

Doesn't that pretty much throw the "fairness" rhetoric about a jury out the window? Someone claims to be a flaming racist and bigot, so you assign them to help determine the outcome of multiple court cases? For that matter, does she not have the right to "a jury of her peers" to decide whether this "sentence" is appropriate?

My current understanding is that many people fill out the questionnaire with the intention of appearing biased - so they can avoid being picked and having to serve. Not that, that makes it right, but perhaps that's one reason why Garaufis came up with the sentence he did?

Seems plausible. To quote Homer Simpson "the trick is to say you're prejudiced against all races"

 

[HowToBe]

Doesn't that pretty much throw the "fairness" rhetoric about a jury out the window? Someone claims to be a flaming racist and bigot, so you assign them to help determine the outcome of multiple court cases? For that matter, does she not have the right to "a jury of her peers" to decide whether this "sentence" is appropriate?

My current understanding is that many people fill out the questionnaire with the intention of appearing biased - so they can avoid being picked and having to serve. Not that, that makes it right, but perhaps that's one reason why Garaufis came up with the sentence he did?

Seems plausible. To quote Homer Simpson "the trick is to say you're prejudiced against all races"

Yeah, that's the reasoning behind the "sentence" according to the article. I just have to wonder, doesn't a judge have the power to assign a more reasonable punishment, which doesn't play around with the supposedly somewhat "sacred" position of juror?

I guess what's more important is this: This behavior casts several tenets of "American justice" out the window (reveals them to be untrue):
1. Selection for jury duty is random: Clearly not in this case!
2. Jury duty is an honor, not a punishment: In this case it was.
3. Judges don't use their power to affect jury lineups: Whoops!

 

[ska]

That's fascinating - in England there is no question sheet or anything like that.

Names are selected from the electoral register, there are some exceptions but not many.

I completely understand why an individual would want to be excused, but declaring oneself a racist seems extreme.

I have served 4 times and fifth time got a letter from my doctor confirming I was suffering too badly from anxiety, and would not have coped responsibly.

The views of fellow jurors frightened me at times, but on balance I think the fsir verdicts were arrived at , almost by luck it seemed - and I found that concerning.
Odd how it works out really, but there is definitely too much left to chance in my view and the wrong verdicts could be reached either way

On one occasion, I reported a fellow juror for out and out racism to the Usher and then the Judge, and the case was started again from scratch, at no doubt a great cost.
I then saw the juror in question some weeks later in my local town centre and it was really unsettling, even though he didn't necessarily know it was me who spoke to the judge.

The cross section of people didn't appear that wide to either , because it seemed they picked a residential area at a time.
Infact i served with some neighbours and relatives on a couple of occasions.

(I recently undertook a "speed awareness course for driving too fast , in Lieu of accepting 3 penalty points on my licence.
Now that was the most diverse cross section of people I ever came across in one room!)

My experience left me less faith in the Jury system - but i have simply no idea what alternatives there might be.

Would professional jurors soon become bias in some way? No jurors but 3 judges? Who knows.