The Real Criminal is Barbara Cartland

Really interesting day today. Interesting and also boring, if that makes sense.

I got called for jury duty. This is not a good week for me, to put it mildly, but I figured I should show up and see if there was any chance I could be of use in a short trial. I have been called a number of times, but I have never been part of a jury because lawyers almost always strike other lawyers.

I showed up at the courthouse before eight today, and a judge came to the assembly room and started working with us. He asked people to come up so they could be excused. He gave various reasons. Felons can’t serve. Pregnant women and seniors don’t have to serve. He also gave a reason that surprised me: doctors and lawyers don’t have to serve. That’s new. I guess they have given up trying to get lawyers to accept doctors and lawyers as jurors.

I could have weaseled out by telling him I was an attorney, but I decided to go with an approach I thought was less selfish. I told him about some very important business I have to attend to this week, and I said I could serve for a day, but that was about the best I could do. He said I would have to talk to whatever judge interviewed me when I was made part of a group of potential jurors.

The assembly room was pretty bad. In Miami, they play bad movies on overhead TV’s, and as awful as that sounds, it beats the Marion County system. Here, they have the TV’s, but they don’t turn them on. They also have some horrendous magazines and books.

I must have been in there for almost two hours before I was called to a courtroom.

The defendant was Jose Manuel Martinez. He’s a celebrity. I didn’t know that. The jurors still don’t know it. We were told we were forbidden to look him up on the Internet to find out about the case. Of course, I have looked him up, because I didn’t end up on the jury.

Jose Manuel Martinez claims he was a cocaine cartel hitman, which means he was a failed human being who was willing to kill people in order make a living. In the movies, hitmen are sophisticated, highly trained killers. In real life, anyone who has no conscience and no valuable skills can be a hitman. The valuable commodity isn’t good marksmanship or Hollywood-style spy skills; it’s a willingness to shoot people without hesitation. That’s really all you need. If you can dig a ditch, you can be a top-notch hitman.

Martinez is already imprisoned, and he is never going to get out. He claims to have killed at least 30 people. I suppose the death penalty is on the table in the present case, so he is probably motivated to seek an acquittal in spite of his existing sentences.

According to the indictments, Javier Huerta and some guy named Oliveira were found in a black Nissan pickup truck on highway 19, next to the northbound lanes, near highway 40. They had been shot to death. This happened in November of 2006, and the trial just started today. I don’t know if Martinez confessed or what. There has to be some reason why it took 13 years to get started. Surely the authorities didn’t find out about these deaths 13 years ago. Defense attorneys can do a lot of things, but I don’t think they can delay trial until an offense reaches bar mitzvah age.

CORRECTION: apparently, the judge couldn’t pronounce “Olivares” correctly. Martinez is accused of killing a man named Olivares-Rivas, not Oliveira. Also, it turns out Martinez bragged about the murders, and that’s why he’s on trial in 2019.

It’s kind of nice living in a county where a judge can’t pronounce “Olivares.” Refreshing.

When I showed up in the courtroom, I didn’t know what kind of trial to expect. I thought there might be some kind of simple felony, and I could serve and go home today. When the judge started talking about dead bodies, firearms, and premeditation, I knew that was not going to happen. He said the trial, including sentencing, could run through June 28th. No; can’t do it. Too many irons in the fire.

When the judge asked if any of the potential jurors couldn’t serve because of scheduling conflicts or prior knowledge of the case, I stood up. Later, he interviewed me, and I told him about my business problems. For good measure, I said I was an attorney. I knew it would come up in voir dire anyway. I was working on my second chance to be excused, and I didn’t want to have the judge hold onto me and then have the attorneys find out about my background. I thought it would annoy everyone involved. They would ask me why I hadn’t told them sooner.

The judge cut me loose, but I still had to return to the assembly room. There was still a chance another trial would work for me. Back to SELF Magazine and Barbara Cartland novels.

Maybe 30 minutes later, lunch rolled around. I did two things. I bought a book of crossword puzzles, and I bought the Kindle version of The Bourne Identity. I don’t like pulp fiction all that much, but I knew I needed a page-turner to keep me from losing my mind. Why, why, why didn’t I think to bring a book of differential equation problems?

They finally turned me loose at around 3:45. I resolved never to offer to serve on a jury again. It’s a waste of my time. They’re not going to take me, so why show up?

There are two unselfish acts I now refuse to get involved with: jury duty and giving blood. Every time I have given blood, they have torn up my arms, so my feeling is that blood donation is not for me. Also, it’s unnatural for a lawyer to GIVE blood.

The earth will still turn if I let other people hear cases and donate blood. It’s not necessary for me to do every nice thing there is.

When I learned who Martinez was, I almost wished I had been allowed to serve. How often do you get to sit on a jury for a celebrity killer? But it was not to be, and also, do I really want to be one of the people who sentenced a cartel hitman to death?

Relax, my Mexican amigos. I’m not the guy you’re looking for. And you might have problems getting past my neighbors.

For all I know, his friends have already hit the jurors with a volley of dead-chicken-and-black-candle curses.

Yes, they do things like that.

Before Martinez came in, I thought another guy was the defendant. I saw an old white guy at the defense table, and I knew he wasn’t on trial. Old, white, and might as well have had “lawyer” stitched on the back of his coat. Next to him, however, there was a young Latin man. He had kind of a smug look on his face, which is not unusual for criminals. He also appeared to be something of a bodybuilder, and prisoners have a lot of time for exercise. Being Latin also contributed to my impression of him; there is no point in denying it. Mexicans really do commit a lot of crime. Look it up.

I assumed he was the alleged perp. I actually prayed for him and his family. It looks like he was another attorney or a paralegal.

Oh, well. Prayer won’t hurt him any.

An older Latin man came in and sat at the defense table. I thought he was a lawyer. Now that I’ve seen Martinez on the web, I know who the older man was.

I prayed for Martinez and his family, too. My guess is that not a lot of people who actually have the status to pray effectively (without voodoo chickens and peyote, I mean) have taken the time to do this.

I feel pretty great about choosing to attempt to serve. I learned how the juror selection process works here, and I realized trying to do it again was not a good idea. I have peace about my choice to quit serving.

I did a number of crossword puzzles, and I got to the point where Jason Bourne’s kidnapping victim has realized the people who saved her from Bourne are not cops. The book is not great. I don’t know if I’ll finish it.

Thank God I was excused. I really need to be available for business this week.