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JUDGMENT CALL: Murder trials like the one...

By Jeffrey A. Perlman and Lisa Mascaro
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JUDGMENT CALL: Murder trials like the one of three men accused of the county’s worst gang-related shooting, now being decided by two juries (B4), strain the county’s Jury Services unit. Sometimes a single courtroom requires 250 potential jurors a day. . . . Still, efficiency continues to rise (above). One key, says jury services manager Evelyn Valle, is the county’s telephone alert system, which allows people to check in each morning to see whether they will be needed.

JURY DUTY Number of people summoned for jury duty at Superior and Municipal courts in Santa Ana. Percentage assigned to court or jury 1987: 39,560: 79% 1988: 38,033: 80% 1989: 35,336: 83% Fees and expenses 1987: $1,039,140 1988: 679,910 1989: 661,200 Source: Jury Services--Santa Ana Superior Court.

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Lisa Mascaro

Lisa Mascaro previously covered Congress in Washington, D.C., for the Los Angeles Times. She left in February 2018. A Los Angeles-area native, she has reported across Southern California, edited, traveled the States and worked in Texas. While the Washington correspondent for the Las Vegas Sun, she contributed as the paper won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. An economics and political science graduate of UC Santa Barbara, she also studied in Budapest, Hungary.

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