Humboldt Crabs Baseball
2012 Season
WEEKLY SCHEDULE Tuesday, July 17
San Francisco Seals 7 PM
Wednesday, July 18
San Francisco Seals Double Header 5:30 PM
Fri & Sat, July 20 & 21
Walnut Creek Crawdads 7 PM
www.humboldtcrabs.com
Crabs Ballpark 9th & F Arcata
Summoned
Many are called — and called — to serve on Humboldt juries By Zach St. George
zachstgeorge@northcoastjournal.com
W
hen Jim Scott saw a red, white and blue slip in his mailbox, summoning him to jury duty, he felt sick. “I just got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach,” he said. “I thought, ‘Oh God, here we go again.’” He’d been expecting the summons. It had been exactly 90 days since the mailman left the last one — right on schedule. Scott gets summoned regularly, at least once a year, usually more. During two separate years, Scott was summoned four times. Since moving to Humboldt County from Ohio 23 years ago, Scott said he’s been summoned close to 40 times. While he’s probably unluckier than most, public records suggest that he’s hardly alone. Anyone with a driver’s license or an ID card from the Department of Motor Vehicles, or anyone registered to vote can be selected for jury duty. At the beginning of each year, the county merges the DMV and the voter registration lists to form its jury pool. At the beginning of the 2010-11 fiscal year, Humboldt County’s jury pool contained roughly 105,700 names. During that year, the court issued 93,000 summonses. So odds are, most people in the pool will get called. Most weeks, the Humboldt County
Superior Court sends out 2,000 jury summonses — 425 every Monday through Thursday, and 200 on Fridays. The court sends so many summons out, said Courtroom Services manager Sara Biasca, because more than three-quarters of those summoned either aren’t eligible, are excused or don’t respond. Humboldt’s summons response rate is slightly less than the statewide average of 30 to 40 percent, said Kristin Greenaway, senior court systems analyst for the California Superior Court system. That could be one reason why some people here feel as though they get summoned frequently. It’s not just a problem for people in small counties like Humboldt, however, Greenaway said. Frequent picks like Scott could just be unlucky, she said — it’s all up to the computer that chooses the names. Kate Lehre also wonders whether that computer is biased. She’s lived in Humboldt for 30 years, and every year she and her husband both receive jury summons. One friend, meanwhile, hasn’t been called for jury duty in eight or nine years of living in Humboldt. Her friend doesn’t vote, but has a driver’s license. The computer is great at randomness, but it can’t tell when two names belong to the same person, which probably means that a lot of summonses go to
Stay up to date all summer long with activities for kids in our May 17th, 2012 edition, or online at www.northcoastjournal.com
8 North Coast Journal • Thursday, July 12, 2012 • northcoastjournal.com