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For our jury system to work, it is essential that the
courts and employers work in partnership to ensure that all Sacramento
County residents are available to serve jury duty when summoned.
Without cooperation from the local business community, we risk losing a
fundamental principle upon which we, private and corporate citizens alike,
depend. Cooperation from employers is essential to maintaining a
strong jury system. The importance of your participation cannot be
emphasized enough.
We wish to extend our deepest appreciation to public and private
employers in the Sacramento community for supporting our jury
system!
Benefits To Business
Businesses frequently benefit directly from our legal
system. The civil litigation system in particular is filled with a
variety of business-related disputes. These may include actions
concerning contracts, product defects, wrongful termination, malpractice,
and environmental issues.
How Employers Can Help
Employers and businesses are encouraged to help support the jury system by paying employees while they are serving jury
duty. Many people cannot afford to serve if they will lose their
salaries or wages. Far too many potential jurors have asked to be excused
because the loss of income would create a financial hardship. If
together, we can decrease the number of people claiming financial
hardship, we create a much broader cross section of society available to
serve. This will help create juries that are truly
representative and reflective of our community. By agreeing to
compensate employees during jury service, not only will employers
continue to enjoy the benefits of the jury system, but they will
contribute towards its improvement.
How Jurors are Summoned
The selection and management of jurors is governed by the California
Code of Civil Procedure. Jurors' names are selected at random from
lists of registered voters and persons who have valid California drivers
licenses or identification cards issued by the Department of Motor
Vehicles. The two lists are combined to create one Master Jury
List.
Five thousand three hundred (5,300)
prospective jurors each week are randomly selected from the
master list to receive a summons. The
summonses are mailed approximately five weeks prior to the service date. The summons contains information and
instructions on how to have jury service postponed; how to request to be
excused from jury service; or how to notify the court of
disqualification from jury
service.
Length of Service
While employers have valid concerns about how
jury service affects their available resources, it is important to know
the steps that have been taken to reduce the length of service for jury
duty.
In order to minimize the number of jurors who must appear in person
and avoid unnecessary inconvenience to your employee and to you, the
standby service or call-in process is used. This means a juror is
instructed to telephone the court or access the court's website for
reporting instructions. The juror may be instructed to report the
same day, the following day or to check back later. Jurors are
required to check the instructions for a maximum of five (5) days or
until instructed that their service is complete without having to
report.
If a juror is selected to serve on a trial as a sworn juror, their
term of service will be the length of that trial. Trials vary in
length, but generally last one to two weeks.
Under the One Day/One Trial system, if a juror is not selected to serve on a trial by the end of their
first day at the courthouse, and the judge has not ordered the juror to
return for another day of jury selection, the juror has completed jury
service. Approximately 80% of our prospective jurors complete
their service in one day.
The implementation of one day/one trial jury service has
helped reduce the uncertainty of when employees can return to
work. The majority of employees will return to work within one to
two days after reporting for jury service.
Pay Policy
State Law does not currently require employers to continue paying the
salary of employees while they are serving as jurors. However,
many employers including state and local government agencies,
have a policy which compensates employees for at least part, if not all
the time spent for jury service.
If employers do pay, they have the right to require employees
to remit to them the fees received for jury service. Prospective
jurors are paid the amount mandated by the State Legislature, $15.00 per
day and 34 cents per mile, one way for the second day of service and
every day thereafter. There is no pay for the first day of
service. "Service" is defined as physically reporting to
the courthouse. Days spent on standby service do not count as
payment days.
Recent legislation (AB1102) changed Civil Code of Procedure, Section
215 that governs payments for jury service. The change now prevents the
Superior Court from paying jury fees to government employees as long as
they are receiving compensation from their employer.
If the juror is employed by a state or
local government agency, they are instructed to fill out a Government
Waiver Form that will stop the jury payment. Once this form is
filled out, they are instructed to return one slip to the jury staff and
keep the pink carbon copy for their employer. The legislation did
not affect payments for mileage. Jurors will still be paid $0.34 cents
per mile unless that fee is waived.
Government employees are described in Government Code Section 481.200
as: “Public entity” including the state, the Regents of the
University of California, a county, a city, district, public authority,
public agency, and any other political subdivision or public corporation
in the state.
Therefore, effective August 16, 2004 a juror who is employed by a
state, or local government entity or by any other public entity as
defined in Government Code Section 481.200, and who receives regular
compensation and benefits while performing jury service, may not be paid
jury fees.
Proof of Attendance
Prospective jurors that are asked to report to the courthouse are
given a daily attendance slip on their first day of service only. This attendance slip is stamped
with the date and signed by the Jury Commissioner. If a
prospective juror is asked to report for two days or more, a Juror
History Report may be provided at the juror's request. The
Juror History Report is printed on the court's letterhead with the Jury
Commissioner's signature and lists each day of the juror's service. Jury
attendance slips/Juror History Reports will not be given to jurors
daily, but will be provided to the juror at the end of their service or
when it is needed for payroll purposes, whichever occurs first. It is the responsibility of each
juror to request appropriate documentation for his/her employer.
Employee Protection
As the employer, you must allow an employee time off to serve on a
jury. The California Labor Code,
section 230 outlaws any
employer from firing or harassing an employee who is summoned to
court for jury service. The California Education Code
sections 44037 and 87036
protect
teachers and students as well. Employers can also be prosecuted
criminally and face a misdemeanor charge if found guilty.
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