New York City
New York Court Discovers 'Justice Is Blind' Was Not Meant Literally
By BSN Staff, . BSN Network. Satire.
NEW YORK, NY -- A Brooklyn Supreme Court judge ruled this week that Albert Elia, a blind man dismissed from grand jury service in New York, may proceed with a discrimination lawsuit against the state, after officials determined that the justice system's most famous brand image was aspirational rather than a staffing guideline.
Elia had been summoned, appeared, and was removed. The court's position, distilled to its cleanest form, was that a man who cannot see the defendant is not qualified to judge the defendant, which is an interesting standard for an institution whose own logo has been wearing a blindfold for four hundred years.
Elia's attorney described the removal as part of "systemic discrimination" against blind people seeking to serve as jurors in New York. The state has not explained why it needs jurors to see things, given that evidence is read aloud, witnesses speak into a microphone, and the whole proceeding is conducted in a room where nobody is allowed to look anything up on their phone anyway.
New York State Court spokesperson Diane Fullerton, reached for comment, said the system "remains committed to an inclusive and representative jury pool" and added that officials "take accessibility concerns very seriously," which is a thing institutions say in the seven-to-ten business days before they begin appealing the ruling.
Elia, for his part, noted that blind jurors serve routinely in federal courts and in courts across multiple other states, a fact the Brooklyn courthouse had apparently not encountered despite being located inside the same country.
Legal observers have pointed out that the average sitting jury already contains at least two people who missed the first forty minutes of testimony because they were deciding whether the defendant's tie was a good color. Elia would have been listening the entire time, which, in a room where evidence is presented verbally, makes him arguably the most dangerous juror the state has ever turned away.
The statue of Lady Justice outside the building declined to comment, but was observed standing very still with a scale in one hand and a sword in the other, which people familiar with irony recognized as her listening face.
The case now proceeds to discovery, during which New York will be asked to produce documentation explaining its reasoning. The documentation will be printed, presumably, on paper.
The story we are making fun of: https://gothamist.com/news/blind-man-dismissed-from-grand-jury-duty-can-sue-ny-for-discrimination-judge-rules