By: Heath Hamacher//August 14, 2018//
Depends on whom you ask, whether a York County grand jury spent one day in June working at the pace of a competitive hot dog eater—only more analytically—or mindlessly fast-stamping indictments like electrical pins through an assembly line.
But according to The Herald newspaper in Rock Hill, a collection of citizens gathered and true-billed 904 cases that month, sending forward every case they “considered” on June 14.
According to solicitors, including 16th Circuit Solicitor Kevin Brackett, those grand jurors worked long and hard, and the indictments are “proper and appropriate.”
According to 27 defense attorneys who moved to have the indictments tossed and a new grand jury picked, the indictments were “rubber stamped,” and there’s no way grand jurors properly considered all the evidence.
Solicitors said grand jurors toiled for 10 hours. That’s roughly 39 seconds per indictment. This Sidebar reporter has never served on a grand jury, but that seems an awfully short amount of time to investigate alleged criminal conduct and sign off on a formal accusation.
But then again, one can accomplish a lot in 39 seconds. To illustrate, I did a small experiment after reading the grand jury article, and here are several things I was able to accomplish in under 40 seconds:
Run half a sink of dish water.
Guzzle a can of V8.
Leisurely fold five T-shirts.
Brew a K-Cup.
Log on to sclawyersweekly.com.
Almost make myself a ham sandwich. Before time ran out, I spread the mayonnaise, placed the ham and cheese, and had my hand on the mustard container. I was that close.
Fun fact: Because my wife and I have Mexican food at least twice a week, I know that it takes me six to nine minutes to “prepare” the takeout for our consumption once I get the bag open.
But I never knew how long it took me to fix a ham sandwich. And honestly, I feel a little inadequate. Because what kind of man must I be that I can’t fix a ham sandwich in 39 seconds, but a whole bunch of York County grand jurors, some might say, can indict one.