Juror Information

As a juror, you will be on call for four to six report dates throughout a four-month period. You may serve on one or more trials. For those individuals needing disability accommodations, please call Judge Gormley’s Jury Coordinator at 740-833-2531 or Judge Schuck’s Deputy Jury Commissioner at 740-833-2558 to report the type of assistance you will need during your term of service.

Length of trials can be different for each specific case. Our jury trials most often extend beyond the one date indicated depending on the cases scheduled. There are occasions where Monday or Tuesday trials could last three or four days. Thursday trials usually last two days. The judge will tell jurors how long a trial is expected to last during the jury selection process. Please keep this in mind when scheduling around each of your jury service dates

To determine whether you need to report on your scheduled date, please call the jury service number for your designated judge. The recorded message operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Judge Gormley’s jury-service number is 740-833-2538. You may call the day before your report date after 4:00 p.m.

Judge Schuck’s jury-service number is 740-833-2560. You may call the day before your report date after 5:00 p.m.

Please also remember to call again prior to your departure for the courthouse for any last minute changes or instructions.

You will receive a packet from the judge’s office via mail approximately six (6) to eight (8) weeks prior to your term of service. The packet will include a Juror Questionnaire, Request for Excuse Form, Juror Information Sheet, two Maps and a Parking Pass. Also enclosed in your packet will be a Summons to Serve as a Juror indicating a list of specific report dates. You have two options in order to complete the required forms.   If you prefer to complete the juror questionnaire online, please go to https://secure.co.delaware.oh.us/jury/ and enter the first three letters of your last name and date of birth.  You also have the option of completing the juror questionnaire provided in your packet.  Regardless of which option you choose, you must submit your paperwork on or before the date indicated.

If you do not wish to complete the forms online, please fully answer, date and sign the juror questionnaire in your packet.  For your convenience, a self-addressed, stamped envelope has been provided for the return of your information.  Please be sure to complete the address, telephone number and email section at the bottom of the second page.  Underneath the requested personal information, you will also need to acknowledge receipt of the Summons to Serve as a Juror by signing the signature line.  Also, please do not fax your questionnaire as we do need the original. Only the judge or an assigned representative is authorized to grant this type of temporary excuse from jury.

If you know of days during your scheduled term of service when you cannot be present for Jury Service (i.e. a business trip or a vacation), you must notify your judge and/or their jury coordinator in writing and secure a temporary excuse from reporting on the designated date.

The judge WILL NOT review requests for excuse without a completed questionnaire.

If you were selected as a juror for Judge James P. Schuck, please direct all correspondence to his Deputy Jury Commissioner, Johnine Marstiller, Court of Common Pleas, Delaware County Courthouse, 117 N. Union Street, Level 300, Delaware, Ohio 43015. You may also submit your requests through e-mail to Johnine Marstiller at jmarstiller@co.delaware.oh.us and she will respond to you at her earliest convenience. You may also send a fax to 740-833-2559, but again, please do not fax your questionnaire.

If you were selected as a juror for Judge David Gormley, please direct all correspondence to his Jury Coordinator, Carla Dakhteh Court of Common Pleas, Delaware County Courthouse, 117 North Union Street, Third Floor, Delaware, Ohio 43015. You may also submit your requests through e-mail to Carla Dakhteh at cdakhteh@co.delaware.oh.us and she will respond to you at her earliest convenience. You may also send a fax to 740-833-2559, but again, please do not fax your questionnaire.

If you have any questions regarding your jury service, please contact Johnine Marstiller, Deputy Jury Commissioner for Judge Schuck (740-833-2558) or Carla Dakhteh, Jury Coordinator for Judge Gormley (740-833-2531), Monday through Friday between 8:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. If mailing any documents, please send to Delaware County Common Pleas Court, 117 North Union Street, 3 rd Floor, Delaware, Ohio 43015.  Also, you may contact Johnine Marstiller at jmarstiller@co.delaware.oh.us. or Carla Dakhteh at cdakhteh@co.delaware.oh.us

Please use good judgment and report for jury duty properly dressed. Mini-skirts, shorts, tank tops, tube tops are INAPPROPRIATE ATTIRE.

The courthouse has moved to 117 N Union Street. Access to the courthouse is from Union Street.  A parking map is located here.

Further information on visiting the courthouse can be found here: Plan Your Visit.

As a juror, you will be on call for a four-month period, which will include four to six specific report dates.

• You may be requested to appear for jury duty several times during your four-month period or you may not be requested to appear at all.
• If you are selected as a juror, you may be involved in either a criminal or a civil trial. Our jury trials most often extend beyond the one date indicated depending on the cases scheduled. There are occasions where Monday or Tuesday trials could last three or four days. Thursday trials usually last two days. Please keep this in mind when scheduling around each of your jury service dates.
• If you are not selected as a juror when requested to appear, you are normally released within two to three hours once the selected jurors are seated.
• To determine your need to report while you are on call, please use one of the following methods.
• You must call the specific jury answering line for each judge prior to each of your report dates for instructions.
• Judge Gormley’s jury-service number is 740-833-2538. You may call the day before your report date after 4:00 p.m. Please also call prior to your departure for the courthouse for any last-minute changes.
• Judge Schuck’s jury service number is 740-833-2560. If you have a Monday or Tuesday report date, call the day before your report date after 5:00 p.m. If you have a Thursday report date, call on Wednesday after 5:00 p.m. Please also call prior to your departure for the courthouse for any last-minute changes.
• You may also check the Delaware County website on the Jury Information Page to see whether or not you will need to report for jury duty on your scheduled dates. This DOES NOT apply to Grand Jurors. All Grand Jurors are required to report on their scheduled report dates. Since the judges’ dockets do not apply to you, please do not check their trial schedules.
• If you go to the Delaware County Website at www.co.delaware.oh.us click on Common Pleas Court then “Jury Information,” and you can access the reporting confirmation pages for both courtrooms and read the message relating to whether or not you need to report for jury duty on your scheduled date. Please make sure you know your designated judge so you check the correct courtroom.

Jurors will receive $25 for each day they report for jury service.  For those jurors actually seated on a trial, you will receive $40.00 for each day you are here.  Jury fees will be paid within 60 days after your jury service.

You are NOT permitted to investigate any case prior to coming to court or while serving as a juror.  This especially means that you should not be searching the internet, newspapers, or any other media for information on court cases.  Additionally, you should not receive or send electronic communications about court cases.  This includes texting, emailing, blogging, posting information on social networking websites, or using any other electronic communications to discuss, or even mention, specific court cases.

A list of restaurants can be found here.

Further information on visiting the courthouse can be found here: Plan Your Visit.

In Delaware County persons are selected at random for jury service from the Board of Elections. If you have spelled your name differently or if the information at the Board of Elections is not up-to-date, you may receive additional summons. If you have received a summons for a deceased relative, please indicate that person is deceased, sign the summons and return it in the envelope provided. We will attempt to not send further summons; however, if the name of a deceased person remains on the source list, you may receive additional summons. The only way to ensure that this does not continue is to contact the Board of Elections and have the name removed from their list.
In some counties and in federal courts, the list of registered automobile drivers may be used. Jury trials are held in the United States district courts, the common pleas court of each county, municipal courts and county courts.

To serve on a jury in a particular court, you must be a resident of the geographical area served by that particular court. Ohio jurors must be at least 18 years of age and they must not have lost their right to serve on a jury by having been convicted of certain types of crime. Beyond that, everyone is given the opportunity to be a juror regardless of age (if at least 18) and regardless of occupation.
If you are 75 years of age or older, you may request to be excused from jury duty.

Petit Jury:
If you are selected to serve on a Petit Jury, you will hear a case which is criminal or civil. A criminal trial will involve a felony (a more serious type of crime). The law requires twelve (12) jurors to be seated in a criminal case, only eight (8) jurors are required in a civil case. In a criminal trial, the jury must find a defendant guilty or not guilty by unanimous vote. In civil cases the law requires a vote of at least three-fourths of the jury to reach a verdict. Most jury trials will seat an alternate juror(s), in the event sickness or unforeseen circumstances arise in which one of the regular jurors are unable to attend some portion of the trial. The alternate juror hears the trial, in its entirety, but does not participate in jury deliberations.

Grand Jury:
A Grand Jury hears evidence about crimes and decides whether or not a person should be indicted and tried for committing a crime. The grand jury does not decide guilt or innocence.

In Delaware County, you may expect to be on call for five or six dates when summoned for service as a petit (trial) juror.  Your report dates will be listed in the paperwork that we send to our prospective jurors.  During your term of jury service, you may be asked to report to the court more than once.  Each time you are asked to report, a different case will be involved.  The typical jury trial lasts for two or three consecutive days.  More complex trials may last longer.

At the end of a typical jury day, jurors are dismissed to return to their homes and then they will return to court the next day if the trial is not finished.

When you arrive at the courthouse, please report to the jury assembly room on the third floor to sign in. We provide a brief orientation talk and video to help acquaint you with the system. Then the jurors are taken to the courtroom for a selection process called voir dire. All prospective jurors take an oath or affirm that they will truthfully answer questions posed to them by the judge and the attorneys during the selection process.

The purpose of this questioning is to find out if there is some reason why it might be difficult for a prospective juror to be fair and impartial in the case to be tried. As a prospective juror, you are introduced to the parties and the attorneys in the case and given a list of probable witnesses. If you have some relationship to one of these persons, it might be difficult for you to consider the case impartially and you should inform the judge immediately.

You are told a little about the facts of the case so that the court can determine if any past experience or prejudice might make it hard for you to be fair. You also have an opportunity to tell the court about anything else that might impact your ability to sit as a juror.

Generally, each side in a case has the right to ask that a certain limited number of jurors be excused without giving a reason (called a peremptory challenge). Each side can also make an unlimited number of challenges for cause(for a good reason). When attorneys make these challenges, it is not their intent to personally attack potential jurors, but to ensure that they select jurors who can evaluate the case as fairly as possible for their clients.

Yes. The parties involved in a case usually try to settle their differences and avoid the time and expense of a trial. Sometimes a case is settled only minutes before the trial begins. Therefore, even though many trials are scheduled each day, some of them will not actually go to trial and therefore, those cases will not need juries.

However, your time spent waiting to serve is not wasted; your presence encourages settlement.
Additionally, when we receive the names of jurors from the Board of Elections, everyone is assigned a number. Jurors are always called in numerical order. Since the judge only needs a limited number of jurors to actually sit on a panel, those jurors not seated will be excused until their next report date.

If you are summoned to appear for jury service, have not been excused, and then fail to appear on your assigned date, the judge may find you in contempt of court.  Before you are held in contempt, you will be ordered to “show cause” – which means to provide a good reason – why you failed to comply with the order to appear for jury service.  If the judge finds you in contempt, you may be ordered to pay a fine and could be sent to jail.

After the jury has been selected, the jurors must stand and take an oath or affirm that they will well and truly try the particular case for which they have been chosen, that they will wait until all the evidence has been heard before making up their minds and that they will follow all of the judge’s instructions.
Jurors must pay attention throughout the trial and do their best to determine the credibility of each witness. Jurors are not permitted to discuss the case among themselves or with anyone else until all the evidence has been presented, the attorneys have made their closing arguments and the judge has instructed the jurors about the law that applies to the case. Jurors may not do any independent investigation of the matters involved in the lawsuit and they may not discuss the case with anyone outside the courtroom until after they have deliberated in the jury room and arrived at a verdict. Even then, they do not have to discuss the case with anyone, although they are allowed to do so after the case has been decided.

After the attorneys have presented their evidence and made their closing statements, the judge instructs the jurors about the law that applies to the case. Jurors must decide cases based on the laws as they are and not as the jurors might like them to be.

Following this instruction, the jury goes to the deliberation room to consider the case and reach a verdict. The jury first elects a foreperson who sees to it that discussions are conducted in a sensible and orderly fashion, that all issues are fully and fairly discussed and that every juror is given a fair chance to participate. If the jurors have a question during their deliberation, they may write it down and ask the bailiff to deliver it to the judge.

When a verdict has been reached, the jurors agreeing to the verdict sign a form and notify the bailiff. The verdict is read by the judge and the judge then dismisses the jurors.

The type of case determines the number of jurors who must agree on a verdict.

A civil case usually focuses on a legal dispute between two or more persons, companies, or other entities.  The party suing for compensation or some other legal remedy is called the plaintiff.  The party being sued is called the defendant.  In a civil case, the jurors must decide whether the plaintiff is entitled to compensation or some other relief from the defendant, and at least six jurors must agree on a verdict.

In a criminal case, the person charged with committing a crime is called the defendant. The county prosecuting attorney files and prosecutes criminal cases in the name of the State of Ohio.  Any verdict in a criminal case must be unanimous.

It is understandable that persons may be apprehensive about being called for jury duty. They may fear that their time will be wasted or that the experience will be negative.

However, most jurors find that the experience is positive. They have the opportunity to learn a great deal about the legal system and about the particular subject matter of the lawsuit. They may also make some good friends during the course of their service.

Court officials are careful to treat jurors courteously and professionally. They know how important jurors are to the task of achieving fair and just results for those who come before the court. The benefits to individuals who serve as jurors is significant, but most significant are the benefits of jury service to the entire community.

Parking
Disabled jurors who drive an automobile but who have difficulty walking long distances will find parking spaces available at the back door of the courthouse.

Transportation
Unfortunately, Delaware County is not able to provide transportation for disabled jurors.

Wheelchair Accessibility
The courthouse and its courtrooms are fully accessible.

Ohio Revised Code 2313.19 provides that no employer may discharge, threaten to discharge, or take any disciplinary action against a permanent employee who is summoned to serve as a juror if the juror gives reasonable notice to the employer of the jury summons prior to serving as a juror.

Additionally, your employer cannot require you to utilize annual, vacation, or sick leave for the time spent serving as a juror.