Dismissal for Cause 101: a law school course pseudoaunt should teach

She looks really nice here, but she's a pit bull in the courtroom.

I was overly optimistic about how quickly voir dire and jury selection would proceed. Just before noon we had a qualified jury, and then peremptory challenges began. Voila! Once more we'd have an unqualified juror. it happened six times in a row, for that matter. Pseudoaunt was the cause in every case. The lead prosecutor was willing to settle for peremptory challenge bounces on the last two of the jurors, but pseudoaunt pushed for dismissal for cause on the basis of a single answer one woman gave that indicated a possible bias against law enforcement in one instance, and a single answer to a question provided by a woman indicating a possible bias against the testimony of an expert witness in another case, and the judge went for both of them.

The defense used up eight peremptory challenges to the prosecution's zero.  We potentially have thirty-two additional peremptory challenges, and that's not taking into consideration that pseudoaunt can probably get another dozen or so jurors dismissed for cause. The chances of us leaving for Utah on Monday are somewhere between slim and none at all.

At one point I must've made a face when a juror was tossed for cause. Pseudoaunt hissed at me to knock it off. The lead attorney didn't think I had done anything wrong. Pseudoaunt told him she had practically raised me and that she knows as well as anyone what my faces mean, and she said she was not letting a biased juror on the panel just because I wanted to leave for Utah on Monday morning. The lead attorney laughed. Potential jurors heard the exchange and were laughing at us. We're a really professional team; that much is certain..

I'm spending the night at the pseudorelatives' house tonight. We went over jury pool information for tomorrow so we would both be ready. Now r're stretched out on a sofa and recliner in the living room with warm quilts because their house is drafty, and we're listening to pseudouncle play the piano.

Tomorrow will probably be more of the same but possibly even worse. please pray for me.