Lasting courtship: Married couple ends up on same jury

At the start of a recent drunken driving trial, Monroe County Court Judge Douglas Randall asked prospective jurors a boilerplate question: Do you know anyone in the courtroom?

One would-be juror, Jack Dick of Honeoye Falls, raised his hand.

Who would that person be, Randall asked.

Dick then pointed to another prospective juror in the courtroom — his wife, Barbara Dick.

That brought a few laughs from the others in the courtroom, as did the next question and answer.

Randall asked Dick whether he might be unfairly persuaded by the opinions of his wife if they both ended up on the jury.

"I said, 'It hasn't happened in 43 years,' " Dick said in a recent interview, "and everybody really burst out laughing then."

Barbara Dick's recollection of the moment is largely similar, with a slight variation.

She remembers Randall asking her husband whether Dick could disagree with his wife if they had different opinions of the evidence. Her husband said that the couple hadn't agreed on anything over the past 40-plus years so "no, it wouldn't be a problem," Barbara Dick said.

When the voir dire — the questioning of prospective jurors — was over and a jury chosen, Jack and Barbara Dick were two of those selected.

A loose survey of individuals in the legal community say they don't recall this happening in recent memory. Longtime employees in the District Attorney's and Public Defender offices didn't recollect a married couple on the same jury. Matthew Rich, a former prosecutor who is now a defense lawyer, said he never witnessed it before either, but it sounded like a recipe for a hung jury.

Randall, who was a prosecutor for 27 years before his 2011 judicial election, told the couple he'd never encountered a married couple on a jury, said Jack Dick.

At the end of each day, Randall reminded the jurors that they could not discuss testimony or evidence with anyone — including spouses — once they left the courtroom.

"We get home and I was sitting there and I looked at Barbara and she looked over at me," Dick said. "I do the zipper mark across my mouth. She started laughing.

"If the other one looked like they were pondering, we would give the zipper (signal) to each other."

Defense lawyer Jim Napier, who represented the accused, said the couple impressed him during questioning. Barbara Dick, 72, is a retired teacher and social worker; Jack Dick, 69, is an executive vice-president with the Canandaigua-based fire safety equipment distributor, Heiser Logistics.

Jack Dick "was in the first panel (questioned), and he seemed like a fair and honest guy and straightforward and I liked him so I wanted him on the jury," Napier said. "... Then Mrs. Dick said that she was an independent thinker and it wouldn't influence her at all having her husband on the jury. She seemed honest and straightforward and impartial.

"I wanted her on the jury and the prosecutor didn't have any problem with it."

Because he was the first person chosen, Jack Dick became the foreperson. Along with drunken driving, the defendant was also accused of unauthorized use of a vehicle and obstructing government administration.

A city police officer testified that he saw a man driving a car erratically and followed him for a distance before the man stopped and fled on foot, Napier said. The officer questioned a female passenger still in the car, who claimed she did not know the man who was giving her a ride.

Later, the officer encountered a man who he thought resembled the individual who'd fled, Napier said. And, while questioning him, the man, who appeared visibly drunk, received a call from the woman who'd been in the car, police alleged. He was arrested.

However, at trial, police failed to convince the jury that the accused was the man in the car.

"I think a lot of jurors thought it was him," Jack Dick said. But, he said, the evidence wasn't enough to prove the accusations "beyond a reasonable doubt."

Initially, in deliberations, the jury stood at nine to three for acquittal, he said. He and his wife agreed with the majority. Over deliberations, and after more definition from Randall about the legal burden of proof, the jury eventually reached 12 votes for acquittal.

The two had postponed several times before when called for jury duty. They volunteered to come the same week in July, not expecting they could land on the same jury.

"I was on my last postponement," Barbara Dick said. "They would come and get me in leg irons if I postponed again."

However, she said, she found the experience educational, and thinks all should serve on a jury as part of a civic duty. Judge Randall, she said, was helpful during deliberations, especially whenever jurors found they needed another explanation of the law.

"We would encourage everyone given the opportunity to serve," Barbara Dick said — even if with your own spouse.

GCRAIG@Gannett.com