We’re from California but currently house sitting in North Carolina. We’re going to Europe in June for about 5 months, and my husband just got called for jury duty back in California. He’s going to postpone it, naturally, but there is a limit to how many times you can postpone. We have no plans to be back in California any time soon.
Has anyone had to deal with recurring calls for jury duty while away, and how did you handle them? Thanks.
Kudos for wanting to do your civic duty.
Is there a place on the form or online or a phone number to explain your situation?
Can’t speak to California, but in DC you are allowed 3 deferrals of 3 months each. At least that is how it was pre-covid. I’d get called for jury duty every 2 years from 2005 to covid. But never spent more than a day in the assembly room and never served on a jury. Since covid, not been called at all, maybe because they know I am over 70 and there is an automatic exemption?
But some stories, I’ve only served on 1 jury -
I lived in Houston, Texas for 3 years - my first job and served on a traffic court jury.
But jury calls -
Minnesota for 15 years and never got called for a jury.
LA County for 7 years and got called twice but never selected - the jury assembly room in Pomona was wonderful - top floor of a 7 floor building with floor to ceiling windows looking west to the San Gabriel mountains and a really great snack bar/restaurant.
DC - as noted got called every 2 years.
I lived in LA County until I was 35, and I only received one summons, and it was just as we were moving, so I never served. We moved to a much smaller County and now receive a summons every other year. I’ve heard that small counties require more service, but seem more manageable to work with. On several occasions, I’ve had to postpone due to other commitments, and rather than assign a new date, they left it up to me to follow up when I would be available
Each jurisdiction has its own rules, so knowing what other sitters did won’t help you. Check with locals if you want laymen experiences. If I were you, I’d just call the court and ask directly.
Where I’m at, they postpone a year at a time. If you can find out their process, that may help you be able to plan it out.
When I lived in Massachusetts they had a very sensible system called “one day or one trial”. They sent you a notice instructing you to pick a date in the next 12 months to appear for jury duty. On that day, if you were picked for a trial, you served for only that trial for as long as it lasted. If you were not picked that day, you were done. So you chose a date when you knew you would be free for a few days if you were selected for a trial. Your employer had to give you that time off, paid.
If at any point you realised that the date you chose was not going to work for you after all, you could simply show up when it was convenient for you as long as it was before the original date. You could not get out of doing jury duty with this system so they got a more diverse pool of jurors and it was easier for people to work serving into their schedules. The state was the first one to start doing this, in the 80s. I wonder if other states have adopted this system.
I’m in Sonoma California and get called up ridiculously often! It’s gotten harder to get out of but I think you can postpone once, up to six months out. I’d suggest you postpone then hope they let you do it again, but you may need to have the new summons and juror number in order to postpone online. They don’t give you many options for postponing online anymore but you could call. You may need to provide proof you’re out of the country. (Also, I can tell you three people this year told me they skipped jury duty here with no repercussions. Maybe they weren’t called in, maybe they don’t have staff to follow up. Worst case, you could provide proof after the fact you were not here.)
Thanks, everyone, for your responses. When I was living in CA, I rarely got called, but then I served on a jury and got called a couple of months later! Seems pretty random, but maybe there’s a rhyme & reason to it that I’m not aware of.
I think we’ll just postpone and hope for the best. If either of us get called while we’re in Europe, we’ll definitely be able to provide proof that we’re there.
Technically you shouldn’t be called for at least a year after serving on a jury in CA, so the system is messed up. I’ve been summoned 5-6 times in 9 years in Sonoma but only three times in 22 years in San Diego. My husband almost never gets summoned. A friend suggested I get called more often because I’m responsible and honest and always show up, so I’m rethinking that strategy 
I think your plan is solid, go have some fun.
Note: Depending on the jurisdiction and judge, they can issue a bench warrant for your arrest if you don’t show up for jury duty. They usually won’t go looking for you, but if you happen to get stopped — like getting pulled over for speeding or whatever — they might take you into custody, because the bench warrant is on record.