Earnesty In This Sunday's Trib Whispers?

It seems a "worthy" candidate running for State Representative in the 52nd District has contacted the Tribune-Review's Whispers reporter about my Federal jury duty.

I hope if it sells papers, I get a cut since I am not accepting campaign contributions from people or groups from outside of the 52nd District like the rest of the candidates are doing.

Here's what happened with my Federal jury duty:

I received a summons for Federal jury duty that lasts 2 weeks, sometime toward the end of last year. I filled out the questionnaire and all of my employee info.

One of the questions asked if taking 2 weeks off from work would cause a hardship.

Well, the answer was yes, so I requested to be excused because:

1. Since I am not a career politician, self employed, retired, or employed by the government (like my opponents), my employee only reimburses me for 1 week of pay during jury duty, so I would lose a whole weeks pay.

2. It would have been a waste of time and the government's money to have me drive down to Pittsburgh to sit in the jury pool and not get chosen to serve on a jury, because I am very conservative.

I didn't put this in my request, but I believe that all convicted murderers, drug dealers/users, child molesters, or rapists should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law upto and including the death penalty. I believe life sentences only waste tax money that could be better spent helping the law abiding citizens, instead of pampering criminals.

This would cause the crime rate to drop drastically, not to mention it would help to cut taxes by closing empty prisons.

To make a short story longer, I never received a denial letter for my excuse request and the info that I received with my summons said "request...will be returned as denied...", so since I received nothing, I assumed it was approved.

I received another summons to appear in front of Judge Conti and she said that out of all of the people who didn't show up for jury duty, I was the only one who had a valid reason and should have been excused.

She basically found me not guilty of not appearing for jury duty. She placed me back on the rolls to be chosen for duty at a later date.

Case closed.

I received another summons for jury duty 3 days later for 2 weeks starting April 24, 2006.

I requested to be excused again, since my employer only pays for 1 week of jury duty, so it would cause a financial hardship. Like I said, I am not self employed, retired, employed by a township or city like the other candidates in this race, so I need to work for a living.

So, as you can see, this really wasn't as interesting as one of my "honorable" opponents thought it was.

Oh, by the way, before another candidate thinks this is a great story, I received a speeding ticket right before Christmas on 119, but I pleaded not guilty, because the distances that the trooper used were incorrect and if I was driving as fast as he claimed, I would have been dodging in and out of traffic, but I was coming home from Christmas shopping with my kids and we were singing Christmas carols, so he was mistaken.

If my fellow candidates, any reporters, or any of the great people in our 52nd District ever have a question about me or my family, please don't ever hesitate to ask.

You can always reach me at electearnesty@zoominternet.net.

Until Next Time...Have A Great Day!!!