The Joys of Jury Duty

“Judge not, that ye be not judged.” Matthew 7:1

Next week I get to serve time on jury duty. In the 28 years that I have been eligible, I have been called to be a part of that great institution 12 times. I know many people my age and older who have never been chosen, but I guess I’m one of the lucky few. Out of the previous 11 times, I was chosen to be on a jury 10 of them. I doubt that will happen this time.

One of the questions they invariably ask is “have any of you been yourself or know someone who has been a victim of a violent crime?” It seems that a ‘yes’ answer to that question is the best way to be struck. While in my previous terms my answer had always been ‘no’, this time that will change.

Eight years ago, I lost my partner when he was killed in our home by a worthless man he had been trying to help. For a couple of years before his death, Lee had been involved in an affair with another man. When that relationship ended, I think he started being mired in guilt. He decided to ask the help of a therapist in dealing with this guilt. While I have no problems with therapy as a whole, I feel his gave him terrible advice. It seems he was told the best way to work through his guilt was to try to do good things for less fortunate people. He began first by helping handicapped people, but soon moved on to lending a hand, money, even supplying motel rooms for crack addicts and homeless individuals. While I didn’t know his reasons for this charitable change on his part, I did try to talk him into being more careful with whom he hung around.

One night, when I was out of town one of these homeless crack addicts showed up at our house around midnight trying to get more money out of Lee. He made the mistake of telling the guy he could stay the night on our couch, but that he couldn’t give him anymore money. That night this monster killed Lee, took what money and jewelry he could find, and stole one of our cars. I found my partner a couple of days later when I returned home lying dead on the floor.

I’m not a big fan of the Birmingham police, or the Jefferson County court system. While 4 months later this guy was arrested with my cancelled credit card still in his possession, he ended up serving very little time in jail. It seems the police had made a lot of mistakes in the evidence gathering, and so the County DA thought it best to make a plea bargain with the man. Instead of being charged with murder and burglary, he was allowed to plead guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter. He was given a 20 year sentence, but only forced to serve 5 years in prison. So now while Lee’s short life is gone forever, this man is already free to walk the streets of Birmingham. No, I don’t think the defense would ever allow me to serve on a jury again.

I don’t think Jesus meant for us not to judge people when they are doing wrong. I think he was warning us that God would use the same criteria to judge us one day, as we use when we judge others. I feel as human beings we will always end up judging people on things such as their skin color, sexual orientation, or even the clothes they wear or the things they think. I believe petty judgments like these were always looked down on by Christ, and they are something we should strive to rise above in our own lives. Not an easy thing to accomplish, but the harder we try perhaps the easier the final judgment will be for us.