My fellow libertarians, here's a spending cut that seems petty and counterproductive even to me:
Jurors in some Lake County cases won't get free lunches while serving because budget cuts have forced judges to halt a practice of using public money to feed them.
The changes affect Lake Superior Civil Division Courts but not jurors serving in the better-funded Lake Circuit and Lake Criminal Courts.
Chief Superior Court Judge John Pera said he is frustrated and embarrassed by the move to end lunch payments, a change that is the result of 30 percent spending cuts over the last two years. The civil courts already are at a disadvantage with other courts that receive revenue from tax and user fees that aren't shared, The Times in Munster reported.
It's bad enough to have one's fate determined by the first 12 people who couldn't figure out how to duck jury duty. Just imagine a decision rendered by that panel after it is "disgruntled" at being treated so shabbily. And saying "free lunches" makes it sould like it's a nice, big benefit graciously handed out by the government. It should be considered part of
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Well, it's not like LAKE COUNTY has all those TRIALS pending from all the CRIME there.
Oh wait...they DO...never mind.
(let them eat entitlement "cake"?)
;)
The CIVIL courts don't handle crime. The criminal courts do. If the jurors are disgruntled, do they take it out on the plaintiff or on the defendant?
I'm not sure why the judges can't order that lunch for the jurors be handled as a surcharge to court costs, to be paid by plaintiff unless the defendant is ordered to pay costs. In an lot of communities, judges order that their staff be increased in size when the county commissioners have a hiring freeze on, and the judges get their way. It might be different from state to state, but generally something picking order is consistent.