For many years, certain groups of persons were exempt from jury duty in New York. This included attorneys, physicians, dentists, and even certain businessmen. There were 27 statutory exemptions, and the judges were also permitted to grant exemptions to other persons on an individual basis.
As of January 1, 1996, the rules were changed, and the exemptions were eliminated. The new rules made some minor exceptions and allowed those summoned to delay jury duty once, but required a doctor’s certificate if an exemption was requested on medical grounds. Before the doctor’s certificate became a requirement, women could almost always be excused by just quietly telling the judge that they couldn’t sit for a long period of time, and the male judges never inquired about the reason - they just excused the woman.
Shortly after the new rules were adopted, I received a summons for jury duty in the Rensselaer County Court. A jury was being selected for a criminal case. I fully expected to be excused by a peremptory challenge from the prosecutor because I had previously practiced criminal defense law in that court, ranging from minor misdemeanor cases to homicide cases. I also expected the defense attorney to excuse me by a peremptory challenge because I had been an assistant district attorney prosecuting crimes in that court and had served as Rensselaer County Attorney for 13 years. To my surprise, neither attorney exercised their right to excuse me by a peremptory challenge. I was sworn in, being the first practicing attorney in Rensselaer County to serve on a criminal jury. [Actually, another attorney was also seated. She worked for a state agency but had never acted as an attorney for a client herself, because she told me she was the president of the local gay and lesbian society and believed that, as such, the court or a juror might not be sympathetic to her client. The judge admonished her during the trial for sleeping during testimony.]
The two defendants, who appeared to be in their mid-60s, were charged with attempted burglary and kidnapping. The facts were quite amusing. The crimes took place at a strip shopping center in the Town of East Greenbush. The testimony of a town police officer was that during the evening in question, he and a fellow police officer sat in their patrol car, generally hidden from view in the shopping center, but positioned to observe the drug store at the corner of the strip mall. They were staking out the drug store because a store employee had complained that the previous evening, a Black man had entered the store, spent some time checking out the various aisles, and left without making a purchase. The employee believed that this Black man was casing the store in preparation for a robbery, and the policemen were watching to see if that happened. Although this robbery didn’t occur, the policemen noticed two men (the defendants) on the building's flat roof. The defendants were attempting to cut through the building's roof to gain access to the closed bank below. The policemen identified themselves and ordered the defendants to come down, where they planned to place them under arrest. However, when the defendants came down, they disarmed the two young policemen and hid them, and themselves, in a culvert behind the shopping center. Someone at the scene called the New York State Police, and in a short time, the State Police officers found and arrested the defendants and freed the police officers. The defendants’ attorneys offered no witnesses or evidence. I assumed that they thought their clients’ best, if not only chance, for getting an acquittal or hung jury was to stress the racism of the drug store employee who made the complaint, and that the police thought that because a Black man had been in the store but not purchased anything, it was sufficient cause to believe that he was planning a robbery. His remarks were addressed to the jury as a whole, but particularly to the foreman, a Black man who was a social worker.
I found my experience as a juror to be very interesting and educational. The jury was a mix of men and women, some of whom were genuinely interested in the experience, while others were upset about having to give up time from their normal lives to fulfill their civic duty. During the first morning of testimony, I noticed that some jurors were fidgeting, while others were mumbling to each other. I raised my hand, and when the judge inquired why, I told him the jury would like a restroom break, which was granted quickly. Thereafter, the judge ordered frequent restroom breaks. As an attorney, I frequently had jurors ask me to explain what was happening when the attorneys were called to the bench and spoke in low voices with the judge, or why we were sometimes ordered back to the jury room during testimony. As was the rule at the time, we were not permitted to take any written notes and were not even permitted to have a copy of the criminal indictment when deliberating. Jurors were required to rely on their memories of the testimony and the judge’s charge when we were sent to deliberate. For some reason, the court would not provide coffee in the jury room during the trial until we were sent to deliberate. Some jurors were quite animated in their discussion of the facts, and the foreman mentioned that he had been stopped for “driving while Black” by East Greenbush policemen in the past. While some jurors thought that a conviction for the kidnapping charge was too harsh under the circumstances, as it was unlike their notion of a traditional kidnapping, such as a kidnapping for ransom, the decision to convict on both counts was unanimous. However, before sending word to the judge that they were ready to report, the jurors sent a message to the judge asking if they might also make a statement criticizing the East Greenbush
police for their incompetence, but the judge refused that request, and the foreman announced the verdict.
After we were formally excused, the judge came to the jury room and told us that the defendants, brothers from another state, had recently been released from a federal penitentiary where they had been sentenced for bank robbery.
Several years later, I spoke with the attorney who represented Amil Dinsio, one of the defendants. I learned that the brothers were the most notorious bank robbers in the United States, and they had been previously convicted for stealing $12,000,000 of President Nixon’s money in a weekend burglary of a California bank. It is a fascinating story that has been adapted into a movie and described by Mr. Dinsio in his book, “Inside the Vault.” I tracked down and communicated with his two daughters, one of whom is an attorney. She told me he is considered a hero in his hometown of Youngstown, Ohio.
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