What do you picture in your head when you hear "burglary?" Maybe you think of a man sporting black and white zebra striping and a zorro-esque mask. He is carrying a canvas bag full of cash; you know this because the bag has a massive jet-black dollar sign painted on the outside of it. As he tries to sneak away, a constable grabs him by the arm and throws him in the back of a patty wagon. You hear the crook maniacally laughing as the wagon speeds away.

Later that week, you are assigned to the assailants' trial as a jury member. While listening to the overwhelming witness testimony, you peer over at the defendant as he twists his thin, handlebar mustache and mocks the courtroom with inappropriate smiles and unremorseful gestures. After the seven or eight eyewitnesses, and the presentation of the implicating evidence (yes, the canvas money bag), you and the other jurors return to the deliberation room and revel over just how guilty the man was.

Of course you're a realist. You don't see the world through a child's eyes. When you think of the defendant, you picture an impoverished man with fear or uncertainty in his eyes. You realize that the victims are many times driven to exaggerate information to increase the culpability of the person on trial. You don't know who to trust or what verdict to render. You're emotionally driven to side with the prosecution yet your civic responsibilities force you to internally search for any sign of reasonable doubt. Like watching a sporting event, you want the home team to win, but acknowledge that they must earn the win by defeating their opponent and are certainly not entitled to it.

I know the fantasy worlds of CSI and Law and Order glorify the legal process, but I also know they try to encompass the "grey areas" and ambiguities of the courtroom that often lead to frustrating results. But never did all my mental preparedness, fueled by what I will label "entertainment-based biases", did I anticipate my first experience of sitting on a jury to be like this. Forget the frustration of watching the home team lose a game, this was like watching a group of mentally handicapped kindergartners trying to play ice hockey against the Pittsburg Penguins: a train wreck of epic proportions.

I literally became uncomfortable at the sight of our justice system and often wanted to yank control from the councils and conduct my own statements and lines of questioning. The defense attorney (which, in my opinion, should have been wearing a helmet during the entire trial) asked incomprehensible questions that confused even the recorder. The prosecutor had obviously been misinformed of the facts because he was contradicted on numerous occasions by the testimony of his own witnesses. The police officers who testified were stumped by the revelation that certain evidence admitted into court was not even related to the case. Meanwhile, nine jury members were robbed of time, paychecks, and sanity as they stood witness to a criminal trial so awful it was...well, criminal.

I could write a detailed account of the trial, but I think that may actually be more dreadful than standing in line at the DMV or being summoned to jury duty (whoops). At least being there allowed me to find comedy in the situation. Besides, my intention is not to upset or bore you. So I will go with long story short and tell you the man was found not guilty because the prosecution failed to provide any conclusive evidence and essentially asked us to find a man guilty based on a probable outcome fueled by assumptions.

The charge was burglary in the third degree. A homeless man was found, by the owners, sitting in the passenger side of a car with the doors closed and the windows up. His hands were not visible and he did not appear to be actively doing anything with them from the witnesses' testimonies. His defense was that he needed to get out of the Sun. Was it a ridiculous defense? Quite possibly, but the prosecution offered nothing to prove he intended on stealing anything. It was April, so the internal temperature of the car could have easily been reasonable refuge from the blistering UV action we experience here in Tucson, Arizona.

The fact is that neither lawyer offered anything good to chew on, but in criminal cases a tie means the defense wins every time. Am I upset that he wasn't found guilty? Not really. In fact, I almost believe the guy. I am sure I am being too optimistic about my fellow man, but it really did seem conceivable that he was just seeking shelter by sitting in a strangers' car. Either way, I honestly don't care. Justice was served to the letter of the law.

In the end, I must admit that I had a true sense of pride having served on a jury. Most people make every attempt to get out of service when they are summoned. I took the route of answering questions truthfully and after doing so realized that I really was a great candidate to be on this jury (read the last sentence of the previous paragraph; that just about sums it up).

So here's to the entertaining fiasco that was jury duty. Bad lawyers, poor evidence, and a far-fetched defense: I wouldn't change a thing.