[Ben M.]

Originally Posted by poncho-mike

He said that he liked to have an engineer on the jury when the case was very solid. He said he liked having engineers on the jury for trials involving financial matters and fraud because they could better understand the paper trail, but the defense would often dismiss them.

Exactly. I got called to jury duty every time I was eligible in San Diego and San Francisco, never picked once. We had a murder trial once and the judge asked us to write a reason why we should be excused and I said that I was an engineer and it would be a waste of time for them to keep me around as I was only going to be dismissed by one of the sides depending on the strength of the case. It worked and I got to go home with the first round dismissed by the judge.

As an engineer you're either going to have one side of the court want you, but the other side not want you and which side it is entirely depends on how the case is going to be presented. Several lawyer friends have pretty much confirmed this as well, if they want someone extremely logical on their side then the other side will likely dismiss them and vice versa.