So now it’s Tuesday and I have to be up early for another event. This time it’s Jury Duty. Yeah me!!! I got to the Decatur court house around 8am and was sure enough selected for the trial (which was a DWI case). I found this quite ironic since I am going to school for Psychology in substance abuse and have many addicts in my family/life, and I just want to help them. So none the less I was not surprised that I was selected for the case, and I was actually kind of excited about it. After I was selected they gathered us 6 in the court room to begin. So all day long we listened to each sides of the case and then breaked for the night a little after 5pm.
The case was about this 61 year old man who was going down 380 (which has been under construction for a long time). He lives in the area so it wasn’t like he didn’t know, but he was arguing that the day it switched over to a one way lane he thought it was still two lanes, so he went down it about a mile and a half going the wrong way (there was signs posted everywhere that it was a one way) and smacked into the back of a huge construction vehicle (the ones that scrap the reflectors off of the road). He was doing 55 and the truck was doing 1 mph. He never breaked or slowed down just ran in to it. This lane was also closed due to the construction, but he didn’t pay attention to those signs either, so the cop suspected he was intoxicated. When the cop went over to check on him he asked to check his eyes (since he could have had a head injury) and he said you can check my eyes but nothing else. When the cop asked him what he meant he said sobriety tests. The cops said I didn’t say anything about you being intoxicated so why would you say that, and he said his lawyer told him too…hmm right. So anyway he refused to take any test to prove if he was or wasn’t intoxicated and the cops didn’t have any evidence he was other than he smelled off it and he was stumbling around and when they did the eye test its results was that he was intoxicated. The cop didn’t have the camera pointed at him either, so we only saw this guy in the video for about 15 seconds. What got me was that he didn’t seem upset/scared/concerned just defensive and aggressive, and when his wife arrived she said “give me your cell phone and belt because you know they are going to take it away”…well how would they know that if they haven’t been down this path before??
They then asked us to come back the next morning at 9am to hear the closing statements and make are decision. So on my way home I began to really think about the case and how it’s scary to think about all the people who get selected for this and don’t care which way they swing. I on the other hand wanted to make the right decision. I would hate to make an innocent person guilty or put a criminal back on the streets.
So none the less after hearing all this and praying about it I was most certain the man was guilty. Now did I want him to be…of course not! I wanted to run over there to him and hug him and tell him that it’s not too late for him. He can still turn his life around and tell him all the wonderful things my Father in Heaven has done for me and that he wants to do the same for him. I was so sadden by the fact that he also was alone in court. No wife…no family…so of course this struck home for me with my father in all.
So right now my prayer is for his salvation and deliverance!
The case was about this 61 year old man who was going down 380 (which has been under construction for a long time). He lives in the area so it wasn’t like he didn’t know, but he was arguing that the day it switched over to a one way lane he thought it was still two lanes, so he went down it about a mile and a half going the wrong way (there was signs posted everywhere that it was a one way) and smacked into the back of a huge construction vehicle (the ones that scrap the reflectors off of the road). He was doing 55 and the truck was doing 1 mph. He never breaked or slowed down just ran in to it. This lane was also closed due to the construction, but he didn’t pay attention to those signs either, so the cop suspected he was intoxicated. When the cop went over to check on him he asked to check his eyes (since he could have had a head injury) and he said you can check my eyes but nothing else. When the cop asked him what he meant he said sobriety tests. The cops said I didn’t say anything about you being intoxicated so why would you say that, and he said his lawyer told him too…hmm right. So anyway he refused to take any test to prove if he was or wasn’t intoxicated and the cops didn’t have any evidence he was other than he smelled off it and he was stumbling around and when they did the eye test its results was that he was intoxicated. The cop didn’t have the camera pointed at him either, so we only saw this guy in the video for about 15 seconds. What got me was that he didn’t seem upset/scared/concerned just defensive and aggressive, and when his wife arrived she said “give me your cell phone and belt because you know they are going to take it away”…well how would they know that if they haven’t been down this path before??
They then asked us to come back the next morning at 9am to hear the closing statements and make are decision. So on my way home I began to really think about the case and how it’s scary to think about all the people who get selected for this and don’t care which way they swing. I on the other hand wanted to make the right decision. I would hate to make an innocent person guilty or put a criminal back on the streets.
So none the less after hearing all this and praying about it I was most certain the man was guilty. Now did I want him to be…of course not! I wanted to run over there to him and hug him and tell him that it’s not too late for him. He can still turn his life around and tell him all the wonderful things my Father in Heaven has done for me and that he wants to do the same for him. I was so sadden by the fact that he also was alone in court. No wife…no family…so of course this struck home for me with my father in all.
So right now my prayer is for his salvation and deliverance!
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