Deputies Don’t Pass Bar By in Jury Foray

The defendant and his public defender were in court. The deputy district attorney was ready to prosecute. The judge was at the bench.

There was only one courtroom element missing that day--the jury.

Municipal Court Judge Marion J. Johnson discovered that there were no jurors available. So Johnson, invoking a little-known statute, sent five sheriff’s deputies out into the streets of downtown Los Angeles to rustle up 12 jurors and two alternates.

The deputies recruited two homeless people, several courthouse janitors and a group of people milling about the courthouse quadrangle. But they were still short six jurors.

So they went across the street to Otto’s Grill and Beer Bar and persuaded six patrons at the bar to do their civic duty.

“One of the jurors thought this was some kind of publicity stunt, like an episode of ‘America’s Funniest Home Videos,’ ” Johnson said Thursday. “He thought we’d have a bunch of cameras in the courtroom and he’d be on TV. He was finally convinced this was for real when he saw me in my robe and I read the complaint.”

The reason Johnson resorted to the unusual means of impaneling a jury was that the case would have been dismissed had it not begun that day--Nov. 25. A defendant in custody has to be tried within 30 days of his arraignment.

“We had to move fast,” Johnson said. “My choice was get a jury or the case would have been dismissed.”

Still, some questioned whether deputies should have recruited patrons who were sitting at a bar.

“I’d wonder about their sobriety,” said James Sebastian, a manager of Otto’s who was working that Monday night. “I’m not saying they were drunk, but if I was on trial, this isn’t where I’d want my jurors recruited from.”

Johnson, who has been on the bench seven years, said he did not tell the sheriff’s deputies “how or where” to get the jurors. He simply issued the order.

“Obviously, if they’d been drunk, I wouldn’t have let them on the jury,” he said. “No judge would impanel an intoxicated person.”

The five deputies walked over to Otto’s about 6 p.m. and told Sebastian they needed jurors. They then went from table to table and asked, “Would you like to volunteer to become a juror?” Everyone refused because they had tickets to “Showboat” that night. The deputies then approached the bar.

“The people at the bar were relaxing, drinking cocktails,” Sebastian said. “They refused. But the deputies were persistent. They said if they couldn’t get a jury, the guy would walk. So they finally gave in.”

It was a misdemeanor case and the defendant was facing several counts, including driving with a suspended license and making false statements to a police officer. Johnson read instructions to the jury and swore them in about 7 p.m.

The lateness of the hour and the usual dearth of jurors before holidays such as Thanksgiving and Christmas made it difficult to assemble a jury, Johnson said.

Sending deputies out into the streets to find jurors is perfectly legal but rarely done, said Judge Robert Parkin, assistant presiding judge of the Superior Court.

“It’s authorized by statute, but it hasn’t been done around here for many years,” he said. “The last time I recall it was about 35 years ago. I was in court in Long Beach, we were short of jurors and the judge sent the bailiff out to a park where senior citizens gathered. He corralled about 15 of them and we started the trial.”

In the case last week, the jurors never had to reach a verdict. The defendant asked for a new attorney and the case was continued.

*

While some at the courthouse applauded Johnson for employing an imaginative solution to a thorny judicial problem, several of the jurors were unhappy. They were under the impression that their duties would be completed that Monday night, but the judge told them they had to be back the next morning. (They were dismissed that day.)

Two of them were so irritated that they returned to Otto’s Monday night after court, resumed their spots at the bar and began grousing. But they soon discovered that their civic efforts had not been in vain. The bartender set down two drinks in front of them.

On the house.