How to get out of jury duty

On Monday morning at 8:30 AM I was at the Court House in Toronto, waiting to perform my civic duty as a potential juror. By 11:30 AM I was released from jury duty and felt like a bird let out of a cage.

How do you get out of jury duty in the city of Toronto? One way is to be self-employed. I was ‘one of those people’ that dared to stand up and asked to be released.

My reasons were simple:

1. I’m self-employed and don’t get paid for being there. Some companies pay their staff when they are on jury duty. My company isn’t one of them.
2. I’m in the middle of several projects for various clients, all of which have tight deadlines. My inability to meet these deadlines would hurt my client’s business and jeopardize my relationship with them.
3. Unhappy clients lead to drinking beer, financial hardship and unemployment cheques.

The court asked me to have one of my clients fax them a letter and explain how my participation in jury duty would hurt their business. By 11:35 AM I was sitting in a client’s office explaining why I need a letter faxed to the Ministry of the Attorney General ASAP.

Stumble It!

Posted in Observations at 9:37 PM