When people hear “jury service,” they usually think of a trial jury. But there is another kind of jury, comprised of the same pool of citizens, that plays an equally important role in our justice system: the grand jury.
The grand jury was established by the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. Federal grand juries are seated regionally, and all states, according to information from the University of Dayton School of Law website, use a grand jury in some capacity.
In Maryland the grand jury is structured the same as it was in England when this country was settled, according to the Grand Jury Handbook by the Maryland Judiciary Public Awareness Committee and Council on Jury Use and Management, and “stands as a barrier between the state’s power to prosecute and the general public. Its responsibility is to evaluate the state’s evidence against a person and decide whether there is probable cause for the criminal charge. This process protects the accused and the public from unwarranted prosecution. It forces the state to show that it is seeking a conviction based on more than rumor, speculation, or hunch.”
Nancy Dennis, jury commissioner, Eighth Circuit Court for Baltimore City, said in Maryland all jurisdictions use the grand jury for the same purpose: handing down felony criminal indictments. Each jurisdiction across the state manages its grand jury’s term of service, scheduling and other particulars. Baltimore City, said Dennis, has the only full-time grand jury in Maryland.
Baltimore City grand jury members serve a four-month term, reporting daily, with new juries impaneled each January, May and September. Jurors are selected randomly from voter and motor vehicle rolls, but their experience, once part of the 23 member panel, is anything but random. Dennis sees to that, coordinating an orientation and training program for grand jurors that thoroughly prepares them to provide the best possible service to citizens of Baltimore.
In addition to the details needed to start their work, Dennis provides experiences designed to help the jurors separate the facts of the criminal justice system from the fiction. “Television can really influence us in many ways,” said Dennis. “We have to sort that out. have to find out it doesn’t work that way.”
She does this by providing direct contact with the people doing the work, sometimes while they’re doing it. From open forums with relevant department heads in the district attorney’s office to ride alongs with police officers, the members see and hear how things work. They tour the gun range and learn how police officers are trained. They tour the medical examiner’s office and have the option of seeing an autopsy performed. They meet with Child Protective Services and learn about the challenges of their work. They learn about forensics tools and how they are used.
“And it’s not limited,” Dennis said. “Anything else the grand jury makes a request about I have to try to provide for them.”
All this adds up to a very effective and independent body, ready to serve the city. Which is good, because this full-time grand jury really does work full-time. According to Dennis, they sometimes hear 10-15 cases in a day.
“It’s incredibly helpful to have them available five days a week,” said Elizabeth Embry, deputy state’s attorney for policy and planning and liaison to the grand jury. “I can’t stress how essential the grand jury is to our work.”
But hearing cases and deliberating isn’t the panel’s only service. Each jury receives at least one directive from the judiciary, requesting they investigate and report their findings. As an independent panel, the results are based solely on the jury’s interpretation of the instructions and how they view the details received. The completed reports are public and can be received upon request from the court.
“We have a lot of good people in the city,” Dennis said. “No matter how they arrive here , reluctantly or willingly, I see people giving their best. Overall I think grand jury service is a very important facet of our society. We’re not protected unless we all participate.”
Former grand jury member Cheryl Addison said, “It was an excellent experience for me. It gave me a better outlook on the city I live in, that I was born in.
“It changed for the good.”
