QUALITY JURORS EXCLUDED BY VOIR DIRE PROCESS

I have been reading with interest the proceedings and rulings in Colorado
in the case of former juror Laura Kriho. For 25 years I have been excluded
from participation on juries by the voir dire process.

I am a former police officer and state trooper; that excluded me several
times. I am an experienced volunteer guardian ad litem and volunteer small
claims mediator; those have also excluded me because of my familiarity with
the courts. Heaven forbid we should allow any person with experience in the
courts to become a juror? Am I a second-class citizen? Am I not a peer of
other citizens? Don't I have a right or privilege to serve as a juror? I
endured my last call to jury duty a month ago, and sat while my privacy was
invaded by questions from both counsel, for information that is really
irrelevant to whether I could be a good juror.

I think I have some rights that are being violated. But we allow the courts
to make their rules of procedure, and there is no other branch of
government to review them. I think this entire process of voir dire,
allowing attorneys to ask people intimate and exhaustive questions, and
then attempt to stretch them to the entire mass of jurors with a single
question, is only a way for attorneys, with the blessing of another
attorney (the judge) to violate people's rights with the assistance of the
court.

Laura Kriho has the right to belong to, and be active in, a fringe group
that advocates the change of existing laws (the hemp initiative). Such
participation should not cause her to lose rights or become unqualified to
serve in any role as a law-abiding citizen.

I believe that allowing either counsel to exclude her from her service
because of her legal participation in such a group discriminates against
her constitutional rights of free speech and free religion. To do so
proclaims that if she might be sympathetic to the defendant, or the
plaintiff, she does not qualify to be a member of a jury of one's peers.
The court compels her to come and serve, she becomes a temporary employee
by payment by the court for her service, and then while serving, an officer
of the court is allowed to discriminate against her because of her beliefs
when holding those beliefs and having spoken out in favor of them is
constitutionally protected. If Laura Kriho were employed in a clerical
person in a corporation, and were rejected for service in an advisory
policy-making committee on the grounds that someone among the corporation's
officers found her legal and private beliefs objectionable, she could sue
them successfully.

Who regulates the courts and their rules? When can we restore the
traditional role of citizens in juries? Under our democratic system the
elected representatives are supposed to legitimize public opinion into law,
the executive officers are supposed to enforce them, and juries of citizens
are supposed to validate them. The courts are supposed to have a role in
validation of laws, too. Nowadays the courts no longer serve their
validation role, because it seems they have their own social agenda and job
security to advance.

T. Dave Gowan
Crawfordville, Fla.
Via Internet