Lifetime Trial Part 1

“A child should feel safe in his father’s arms.”

Those words haunt me and stand out to me as the beginning of a period of personal trauma and growth. They marked the beginning of a trial that affected my life in the deepest possible way and helped shake and shape the person that I was into the person that I have become.

The Summons

The weather was beginning to turn warm in March of 2019 when I received the summons to serve jury duty in Lexington County, South Carolina. It was my first time as a local juror (I had served on a federal trial in 2012). As it was back when I served on the federal trial, my situation was complicated from both a professional and a personal perspective.

First, being an employee of a law firm meant that I took that summons seriously. I notified my boss that I would have to report in April, and he told me that the policy for the firm was to pay for a week of jury duty for the employee. This set my mind at ease for the jury service as I was aware that few trials lasted longer than a day or two (the federal trial was 7 actual days of trial, but I that is the exception rather than the rule). Second, from a personal perspective, my first trial experience had been somewhat tedious, but still extremely educational. If I was selected for a jury, I was both curious and dreading the details of the case I would be part of.

As I was getting dressed the morning of the day I was summoned for jury duty, I heard the newscaster on the morning news.

“Jury selection will begin today for the trial of Timothy Ray Jones Jr., the father accused of murdering his 5 children in August of 2014…”

A lump formed in my throat at those words, and a little tingle on the back of my neck as I had the feeling that something monumentally important was about to happen in my life. Something that would have consequences both positive and negative. I texted my boss on my way to the courthouse to warn him that this was jury selection for a capital murder case (so he could have it in the back of his mind that I may be involved a lot longer than a week).

The first thing at the courthouse that caught my attention was the large crowd of people going into the old courthouse across the street from the main courthouse. The line was long, and there were bailiffs shuffling people into the room. Every square inch of the seats in that courtroom had people in them (think a room the size of the auditorium in a 200-300-student high school). By the time the Clerk of Court spoke to all of us and got things rolling, it was standing room only.

There were several hundred potential jurors in this pool of jurors, which trimmed down by between 30 and 50 with initial questions from Judge Griffith. In the end, we were all divided up into groups of 10 to 12 jurors and voir dire (which is questioning and examination of jurors for their suitability to be a juror on the case) was going to be stretched out over the course of a week-and-a-half to two weeks as two or three groups would be questioned a day until the jury was chosen. And with that, we were sent home to await online notice that it was our turn to “face the firing squad”.

I say “face the firing squad” as if it was a negative. And for those who either didn’t want to participate and felt forced, or for those who were not comfortable being asked questions by attorneys and Judges, I am sure the experience was nerve-wracking. I did not fit either of those categories. I have never balked at the opportunity to serve in things that are my civic duty, and as a general rule I like attorneys and have worked with enough of them to realize that they are people just like you and me who have bills to pay and families to feed. Attorneys have the added stresses of assuming partial responsibility for protecting their clients or making their clients whole in what are sometimes horrid and tragic circumstances. It is a ton of weight to carry, regardless of whether or not the attorney realizes what they are getting into when they begin working in the profession.

A week later I reported to the court as requested (I had gone back to work until my turn came). The questions that were asked were concise and required thought and some reflection. It was only the second time in my life that I was asked to examine my thoughts about capital punishment. But I found that my opinion of capital punishment was that it should be an absolute last resort for crimes of the most horrific nature. While as a general rule I did not like capital punishment (because it removed the opportunity for and results of rehabilitation), I felt that it was my responsibility as a citizen and a juror to consider it as long as it was the will of the people of my state that it be an option. After my turn was finished, I left the stand and returned home (and to work the next day) to await word.

The message from the Clerk of Court dismissed all of the groups that had not been questioned yet and told all of us that had to report to the courthouse on the next Monday for formal jury selection. I called my boss and let him know that I would know something by the end of the day on Monday. And I reported to the court that morning. One of the biggest surprises to me was that the final pool included someone I had worked with up until a year and a half before the trial. I think she was as surprised to see me as I was her. We were moved up to the main courtroom where we were told that they would call the names of the eighteen people that would serve on the jury (twelve jurors, six alternates). The names were called alphabetically and I tensed as the names got into the Ks then Ls (my former coworker was called) and finally Ms.

And there it was…. my name. Stunned, I walked up to the front and sat down in my place in the jury box. They finished calling everyone and dismissed everyone else.

The rules that we were given were fairly simple. No discussion of the case. With anybody. Family, friends, media. Even each other. Follow the instructions of the bailiffs, Judge, Clerk of Court and our security team from SLED (South Carolina Law Enforcement Division, or the South Carolina equivalent of the Texas Rangers). Business casual dress. The Judge knew who the primary and alternate jurors were, and it would be revealed to us when the time came to deliberate. All these rules and information and more were imparted to us, as it was explained the trial would begin the next day.

Arrangements were made to keep us safe and as comfortable as possible. We would not be sequestered fully, which meant we would get to go home to our families after a day in court (but again, the rule that we could not talk about the case). We would be home on weekends unless the Judge decided to hold a session on a Saturday. And we would enter and leave the courthouse through a parking garage on the underside of the building, with agents to transport us via elevator to the jury room and back down to the parking garage.

I called my boss and let him know that I was on the jury, and to put the plan that we had discussed for me to be gone for awhile into place. I then went home to await the beginning of the trial.