Within the castle walls you can see to the left 2 buildings, the front one used to be the magistrates court and the one behind the old prison, the other building stood on its' own is Lincolns' Crown Court and this is where I made my debut in the mid seventies.
No, I was not a naughty boy but for one week........I found myself on jury service and for five days I sat listening to all the evidence presented to the court from the prosecuting barrister to the defence and at times, my head was swimming trying to untangle all the legal jargon but at the end of the week we delivered our verdict, insignificant now as it was so long ago but, at the end of the week I strangely earned more from jury service than I did as an HGV Driver!!
At the end of that week the usher of the court asked for a volunteer to remain on standby jury service for the following week in case of someone not turning up or even the defendant not wanting a certain person on the jury (for whatever reason that may be).
As I had been in the RAF I was always told never volunteer so did not put my name forward....neither did anyone else for that matter. The Usher then informed us that our names would be put into a hat and the one drawn would have to remain......I have never ever been lucky with draws but on this occassion.......it was ME!!!
As it turned out I was only at the court on Monday then later released as I was no longer required.
Regards
Nigel.
