The Court of Public Opinion

I forgot to mention that we finished jury deliberation on Tuesday, reaching a judgement, went back into court where it was delivered, and the trial is now ended.

I'd been keeping fairly detailed notes during the trial, but one is not allowed to write or discuss anything about the case while the trial is in session.  But once everything is over, it's all fair game, and you can "go public" if you like.  The final article is just about finished, with only a little bit of tweaking to do.  I have to decide if there are certain things I want to add, but I think not.  I also did a little bit of research to fill in a few holes.

It's really long -- I suspect that readers of these pages will not be remotely surprised to hear that -- but I mean exceedingly long, even by my standards when I say something is going to be long.  But I wanted it be a detailed, realistic look at the experience, including inside the jury room, particularly since most people don't serve on a jury, especially for a two-week trial..  I've left out all names of all the participants (at least for the time being, that's one of the things I have to decide), but my feeling is that it will come across more objective that way.  Anyway, to get back to when I say it's exceedingly long, what I mean is that it's over 10,000 words, which works out to be about 17 pages.

Yes, that's long.  But not to worry, I won't be posting it all at once, in one massive, head-exploding article.  I've divided it into a three-part series -- basically the opening statements and plaintiff's case, then we get to the defendant, and finally end with the jury deliberation, talking with the lawyers afterwards and final thoughts.

There are a few somewhat unexpected "twists" of a sort along the way.  And I've tried to make it as interesting to read as possible, not anything bogged down by legal minutiae.  Whether that's accomplished is for others to decide.  What I'll say is that I gave the rough draft to an attorney friend, and his first comment was, "That's quite a tale."

For various reasons, I don't think I'll be posting it right away.  Probably the week after next.  But don't worry, it'll be hard to miss...