Lax attitude to jury service may mean cancelled trials

Press, 5 September 1989, Page 34

Lax attitude to jury service may mean cancelled trials

PA Wellington The Wellington District Court staff fear a trial will soon be cancelled because the public is failing to turn up for jury service. “We’ve been sailing very close to the wind. At some time we could be in a position where we have to cancel a trial because people are not responding to jury service,” the court’s manager, Mr Kem Tukukino, said yesterday. He said the public’s attitude to jury service seemed to have changed over the years. In the past they took the summonses seriously and appeared at court.

But recently courts had been scraping to gather enough jurors for service

and trials were being delayed, he said.

Last week more than 200 people were summoned to jury service for two trials at the court. Only 58 were available for balloting. One trial was delayed for about 40 minutes while challenged jurors returned from the balloting of the other trial to be called again. Mr Tukukino said about 100 of 200 jurors summoned would have turned up to serve in the past. These days the figure was more likely to be between 60 and 80. Courts were forced to summon more people to meet trial requirements.

Mr Tukukino said those who failed to attend with-

out being exempted faced fines of up to $3OO. Mr Tukukino suggested the increasing failure to attend could reflect hard economic times. Jurors could fear loss of jobs or pay.

They might also be put off by the “variety of crimes” ending at court, he said.

The courts were looking at the success rate of registered summonses from the High Court to see whether registered District Court summonses would evoke a better response. He said the courts were also looking at other ways of improving the situation but he could not yet comment on them.