Observations About In-court Jury Trials and Remote Hearings During Covid

 Once jury trials resumed in 2021 there were many challenges facing the courts.  Some jurors were reluctant or even refused to come to the courthouse for a trial once summoned.  Despite state court mandates on 2 occasions I had jurors show up on the first day of trial and refuse to wear a mask.  During proceedings it is very important to keep a good record, so the court reporter must be able to clearly hear attorneys, witnesses, jurors and the judge.  Attorneys had to be reminded frequently to briefly drop their masks while speaking.  This was simply an inconvenience.  A more serious issue which I faced was a criminal defendant allegedly testing positive for Covid the night before day one of a long-delayed trial.  Whether it was true or not we could not risk infecting court staff, jurors, bailiffs, and attorneys if the defendant was required to appear for trial.  Many trials throughout MN were delayed because of participants testing positive.  

Some trials were conducted in a hybrid manner with some witnesses appear remotely via Zoom, much as you may have observed in the January 6 Congressional hearings.  This raised issues such as:

1.  Is the witness reading from a script?

2.  Are there others off-camera prompting the witness?  During other hearings I had to ask the party on screen to confirm whether anyone else was in the room.  Sometimes there was a family member or friend whispering "Tell the judge..."

3.  During all kinds of remote hearings, echnology issues such as poor bandwidth or equipment caused us to lose the person on Zoom, or we could not hear them or they could not hear us.

4.  As has been the subject of tv ads, people showed up for Zoom hearings inappropriately dressed, eating or drinking, or smoking, or in a noisy room or outside on their deck.  The trappings of the courtroom and its sense of serious business taking place was largely lost.  

All of the above and other issues with remote hearings caused incredible stress on the participants, lawyers, judges and court staff.  Having retired I have no idea if these issues have abated, but I hope so.  Respect for our system of justice is integral to our democracy, which is under serious attack everywhere.