Harris County Jury Plaza

The security people got a scam going. They take nonthreatening things from you like my plastic key ring tape measure. I said, "you know that is a tape measure," and the guy said, "Yes, here is a ticket. When you come back out you can claim your tape measure." Well, that never happens because the way back to the parking lot is through the tunnel. So you get home and realize now you have to go back downtown, park, and walk to the Jury assembly room to get a $3 item. Or maybe they have confiscated something more expensive, who knows what those guys take home? Anyway, I am pretty sure my tape measure is hanging on that guy's key ring now.
Apr 2nd, 2024

Complete joke. They put you in a room of hundreds of coughing human beings. Start time is not 0800 hrs. It's whenever they get to you. Very unorganized and not sanitized
Feb 4th, 2024

The state decide to extend jury duty out to 75 now! I am over 70 and have health problems but to bad appear or be fined and jailed! You are subject to complete frisking by machine and required to take belt and shoes off! Your guilty until proven innocence. Boy I miss the good old days when the government trusted it citizens and not demand to treat you like a suspect. They know how I felt about it too!
Nov 4th, 2023

I used to think it was cool to perform jury duty, to be honest. Get away from work. See how 'the system' operates. May be im old and cranky now....I felt this was a huge waste of time. And....the bailiff says the judge requires everyone to wear a mask. What? Everyone is slightly to very rude. The good: the Luby's was actually ok and not over priced.
Sep 30th, 2023

Just finished jury duty for Harris County, which has by far the highest caseload between the municipal, jp, and federal systems, all of which call juries in H-town. It is a pleasant enough experience but I'm glad I don't really have to fight rush hour to get downtown. I think it's best to go early, especially if you're not familiar with downtown or the jury process. Park in the jury garage and take your ticket to get validated. The AC in the building is good and the seats are as comfy as seats with no padding can be (my back still hurts). There are really no covid precautions, so I suggest taking an n95 mask (they've actually become pretty comfy) and wearing it in the assembly room, which is quite crowded. You either get called to a court or not (like lucky me!), luck of the draw as far as I can tell. They have free coffee and they have increased the stipend to $20 if you're not called and $58 if you serve on a jury. So I read that the Harris County court system has about 1,500 jury trials in a normal year. Assuming 50 jurists per panel that's 75,000 panelists per year, let's be generous and say 100,000. There's 5 million people in Harris County so let's conservatively say that for various reasons, only 2 million are eligible for jury service. Dividing 2 million by 100,000 gives that you should only be called for jury duty once every 20 years, yet I get called by the county about every two years and with municipal, jp, and federal, I can count on jury duty almost every year. So why don't the numbers work? I have no idea.
Aug 23rd, 2023