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This drum was used by Mercer County court staff prior to 1990 to randomly select its jurors for the following year. Since then the random drawing has been done by a computer program.
CELINA - Mercer County's annual jury draw was once an all-day task for court staff.
They would receive a list of all the county's registered voters from the board of elections, make a card for each person, load up a green metal drum with all of the cards, spin the drum to shuffle them and randomly pick over 1,000 jurors by hand for the next year's court proceedings, with the county common pleas judge, clerk of courts and jury commissioners present.
Luckily, with the introduction of computers in the '90s, the process now takes them about 15 to 30 minutes at the very most, according to jury commissioner Mike Huber, who's also the county's chief probation officer and common pleas court bailiff.
He and fellow jury commissioner Amanda Bennett, also the court's financial administrator, oversee the process of choosing 1,750 random jurors each year.
Those potential jurors are then split up, with 400 of them sent to Celina Municipal Court, 600 to petit jury and 150 to grand jury. A grand jury has 15 jurors, including six alternates, while a trial jury, or "petit jury" has 12.
The leftover 600 names are kept as extras in the event that more jurors are needed throughout the year.
The two jury commissioners are appointed by common pleas judge Matthew K. Fox. They can be court employees, but cannot be of the same political party or attorneys at law.
Their annual jury draw process starts each November, and it still begins with a list of the county's registered voters from the board of elections. However, now commissioners are able to feed the list into the online case management system JuryView. Then, Huber or Bennett will type in how many potential jurors are needed, and the software will spit out a completely random list of potential jurors that they will then use the next year.
"The nice thing about the software, it won't pick their names if they've served on a jury in the last three years - I think is what it's set for," Huber said. "Again, that would be something, if you're doing it by hand, you'd have to go, 'OK, (potential juror's name), he served on the State vs. Smith trial last year, throw him out.' They would do that a lot."
The jury software also allows the commissioners to remove deceased people from their list of registered voters.
"The last thing I want to do is send a notice to someone (who's died)," Huber said.
Mercer County jury commissioner Amanda Bennett signs next year's jury pool on Tuesday after having reviewed it.
The list is then reviewed and signed by Bennett and Huber to make sure all the required information is included. Bennett then stuffs summons envelopes to be sent out to the potential jurors. On jury draw day, which this year was Nov. 25, a sheriff's deputy picked up the envelopes for mailing, as they actually come from the sheriff's office as a summons. The list is then filed by jury commissioners with the clerk of courts.
"We do this three times a year, once for each part term," Huber said. "Not a very exciting process compared to the raffle (used before computers)."
Each year is split up into three four-month part terms, commencing Jan. 1, May 1 and Sept. 1. The pool of 1,750 registered voters randomly chosen every November are who they then randomly pick from to send out each part term summons. Once the juror's four-month term is complete, the sheriff's office will send summons out to another random selection of potential jurors from the pool for the next part term.
"That initial letter has the sheriff's name on it because it is actually a summons. It's a summons that says you've been picked, you're on the list for this part term or this year, or whatever," Huber said. "The sheriff actually gets the envelopes and they send it out."
The summonses come with questionnaires attached that potential jurors must fill out and return to the court by mail, e-mail or in person to the courthouse.
"They fill out their information, they put on there any medical issues, vacation times, where they work, if they're related to law enforcement," Huber said. "(The question about if they're) related to law enforcement, that's (included in) the petit jury questionnaire. The grand jury questionnaire, that one's a little shorter."
The only requirements for jurors are that they must be 18 or older and registered to vote, though they cannot be a convicted felon. Courts can also pull from driver's licenses issued from their county BMV, though that is more common in larger counties, Huber said.
Common reasons someone would get excused from jury duty are if they are over the age of 75, have a medical issue proven by a doctor's note, are out of town or are under financial hardship, Bennett and Huber said.
"We've had folks who are in their 80s serve though," Huber said. "I want to say the oldest person was one year we had a 90-year-old lady serve. It was just a few years ago. She served, I think on a grand jury. She drove herself here. Now, obviously, if they're suffering or they're in a nursing home or have health care issues, we'll obviously excuse them."
Jurors are paid $30 per day if called to serve on a grand jury or petit jury, a rate set by the county commissioners, Huber said. Per the Ohio Revised Code, the maximum per day payment is $40.
While some people have of course given court staff a hard time about serving jury duty, it is very rare in this area, Huber said.
"The nice thing about Mercer County, and I say this to all the juries that we get, is that Mercer County has people that show up for jury service," Huber said. "Are they thrilled to be here? Who is? Let's be honest. But they do recognize their duty as citizens. And so, very rarely do we have someone that really gives us a hard time."
