Australia's Science Forum

I have been called up to attend for jury duty next month. Like most of you, I am the only person at school who can prepare pracs for Science. I can't see how the school can do without pracs (ie without me!) for up to 10 weeks. And if they tried it would take me 10 weeks to get everything back in place!

Have any of you managed to get out of it in the past? What did you need to provide? Any ideas and help would be much appreciated

See your Principal, he/she is the only one, that can help you. The Principal will say it's WHS because 10 weeks is a long time,

Don't like your chances just based on employment restrictions. If a trial actually went as long as 10 weeks, most don't, the school would have to find a replacement. There's a good chance if you get called up you will either receive a message to say you are not required, show up and sit around for hours and then be told you are not required, or get told you will be required. If you get that far, you may still not be selected as a juror (defence gets to question potential jurors).
Your jury notice will list reasons you can be excused. Have a look through those and see if any apply to you.

I'm so lucky I've been removed from doing jury duty. Country town I've been working at the school for over 26 years so if I don't know the accused the chances of knowing a witness is pretty high. Plus I have a disabled son and my sister in law is the assistant sherif.

So what happens if your sick or on long service leave? someone has to do it then.

I don't know if it will still be the case this year but I was called up last year.
It was very easy to be excused, with Covid doing the rounds. If you felt at all uncomfortable ( due to Covid ) they just asked you to raise your hand and bingo you were excused, didn't have to give a reason at all!
As I say, though, that was last year...may not be the same this year.
I didn't ask to be excused, I kept getting attendance notices but didn't have to attend, then the last time I did have to attend, but was not picked. I just wanted to get it over and done with and get off the role for a few years!! Hopefully my name has gone to the bottom of the pile!

I was also called up last year, and even managed to find an ex-student to replace me if necessary.
Luckily when I went in and asked for a shorter trial if possible and explained why (hard to replace, no one else can do the job etc...) they let me off and I even got paid $8.70 for travel!
It doesn't hurt to ask...and you never know, the trial might be cancelled - that has happened to me in the past too.
Good luck!

Thanks for your input, everyone, I don't feel as stressed as I did, I have not been through the process before and thought being selected meant you would be committed to a 10 week trial. I'm not trying to get out of jury duty, just would prefer to wait until I have retired, with all the time in the world!

Prima wrote: ↑03 Mar 2021, 08:18 Thanks for your input, everyone, I don't feel as stressed as I did, I have not been through the process before and thought being selected meant you would be committed to a 10 week trial. I'm not trying to get out of jury duty, just would prefer to wait until I have retired, with all the time in the world!

No problems - it is all a bit mysterious. I worked in the court system for eight years so got a bit of an understanding of jury duty. This was before my horticultural career, before my current job of professional dishwasher Think I've had too many jobs!

Bizarrely, I've never been called up for jury duty, yet I would love to be on a jury from pure nostalgic reasons!

I did it a couple of years ago. Got selected for 2 short (4--5 day) trials. Some people did nothing but come and go. They predict the length of a trial and ask if there's any problems. One was predicted 7 weeks, and I had an interstate holiday booked 8 weeks away. I still had to go into court for selection, but tell the judge of my holiday and then he decided to excuse me. Just as well, the case went 2 weeks over time. Try to have an excuse if there's a long trial. (I live close to school, so could come and go between getting called in and then sent home many days).