Abstract

To address the problem of financial hardship associated with jury service, both the California Blue Ribbon Commission on Jury System Improvement and the Task Force on Jury System Improvements proposed implementation of a tax credit to encour­age employers to pay the salaries and wages of employees who are summoned for jury service. To assess the financial impact of the proposal on California employers as well as the state budget, the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) un­dertook the Juror Compensation Survey to document the extent to which California employ­ers currently compensate employees while on jury service.

The completed surveys were forwarded to the Na­tional Center for State Courts (NCSC) for data entry and analysis. NCSC staff calculated statistical weights for the resulting dataset to compensate for variations in survey response rates across counties and to provide statewide estimates for counties that did not participate in the survey. NCSC also supplemented juror employment characteristics with information about jury operations statewide, including the size of jury panels for felony, misdemeanor, civil, and other case types; the length of voir dire and the length of trials according to case type; and the total number of jurors and alternates ultimately impaneled on the jury.

This abstract has been taken from the author's introduction.

Document Type

Report

Publication Date

8-2004

Publication Information

National Center for State Courts (2004)

Included in

Courts Commons

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