What happens when you skip jury duty? CBS News California investigates Julie WattsOctober 16, 2025 at 3:36 AM 1 James Michael Kruger / jimkruger / Getty Images It's the letter that so many Californians dread: a jury duty summons that warns you to respond and show up or face fines and even jail time.
- - What happens when you skip jury duty? CBS News California investigates
Julie WattsOctober 16, 2025 at 3:36 AM
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James Michael Kruger / jimkruger / Getty Images
It's the letter that so many Californians dread: a jury duty summons that warns you to respond and show up or face fines and even jail time.
But are the courts carrying out those threats, and are they even effective at getting people to show up?CBS News California Investigates correspondent Julie Watts set out to learn what really happens if you dodge jury duty. What she found was surprising.
When Mike Spratt was summoned for jury duty, it was more than an inconvenience for him — his wife, Maria, lives with Parkinson's disease and was home alone while he was at the courthouse.
Spratt also thought he had to appear. Jury summons letters state that you are "required by law" to respond. When it comes to jury duty dodging, it turns out that those three words may not mean much.
CBS News California analyzed last year's jury duty data from the Judicial Council of California, which comes from an optional questionnaire the council sends to courts annually.
Out of the state's 58 counties, 44 actively follow up with people who fail to appear for jury duty, according to the data. Among those 44 counties, 23 send follow-up notices to residents, 22 may order the person to appear in court to explain their absence, six may sanction and 10 may hold people in contempt. Some counties do a combination of these options.
While most courts make threats, about 21% admit they don't sanction at all, meaning residents in those areas face no consequences for skipping jury duty. Among those counties are Amador, Lake, Mariposa, Mendocino, Modoc, Plumas, San Benito, San Diego, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Sierra and Sonoma.
The net effect is that more than 2.7 million Californians failed to appear for a jury summons last year out of approximately 10.6 million that were summoned, meaning one out of four people simply didn't show up. Also of note, 7.5%, or more than 800,000, of all jury summons last year were undelivered, according to the data.
"I think it's a failure of the system," said criminal defense attorney Alexandra Kazarian.
Kazarian defends high-profile clients alongside Mark Geragos, including the Menendez brothers and the woman charged in "Friends" star Matthew Perry's death. She said jury dodgers could rob people of a fair trial with a jury of their peers and thinks courts need to crack down.CBS News California found that, while a handful of counties threaten fines ranging from $40 to $2,000, only six of those counties actually follow up with the jurors to begin with: Fresno, Los Angeles, San Bernardino, San Luis Obispo, Shasta and Yolo.
"You need to focus resources on actually telling people, 'Look, this is a huge deal,' and start issuing failures to appear just like you do with traffic tickets," Kazarian said.
Los Angeles Superior Court jury commissioner David Slayton said they will issue fines as high as $1,000 in some cases. But this past year, four out of five jury duty dodgers faced no punishment.
Instead, Slayton tries to make serving more appealing by offering incentives, saying the court is "trying to balance this issue of not being too heavy-handed, but also making sure that people show up."
Incentives include offering free public transit passes, installing charging stations for mobile devices and making jury rooms more comfortable.
"It's sort of trying to use the carrot more than the stick, but obviously, when we need to use more accountability, we can do that," Slayton said.
We found a similar approach at San Francisco Superior Court, where jury commissioner Jacqueline LaPrevotte said they don't issue fines for jury duty dodging.
"Surprisingly, it would actually be an astronomical cost," LePrevotte said.
Instead, they pay the jurors who do show up. The San Francisco court ran a pilot program paying jurors $100 a day instead of the standard $15 and found that the extra money removed barriers to serving, especially for low-income jurors. This led to fewer failures to appear, a more diverse jury pool, and increased participation among those who face financial challenges.
The program was so successful that the state expanded it to other counties. However, a few months ago, the governor pulled the funding.
"I will say the burden should not solely be on the state," LaPrevotte said.
While employers in California are required to give you time off for jury duty, they don't have to pay you. LaPrevotte believes that needs to change.
"Hopefully, legislation in the future can focus on forcing employers of a certain size to pay their employees for jury duty. It will keep these people coming in the door to serve and maintain fair access to justice.
In the meantime, jury boxes are filled with people who can afford to lose days of income — often retirees like Spratt.
"Everybody's got their own feeling of civic responsibility, and that's probably declining," he said.
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