As someone who has covered legal business for more than a decade-and-a-half and the courts for almost a decade, juries fascinate me. Having followed this world from all kinds of angles since 2006, I’ve never seen what happens inside the jury room first-hand.

Over the past week, I got a step closer to getting that insider’s view: I was called for jury service in Alameda County Superior Court in Oakland. Last Thursday I went to the jury assembly room and filled out an extensive questionnaire. Then, on Tuesday, I went back and sat through a full day of voir dire in the courtroom as part of the venire on a criminal case. I never got called into the box for questioning though.