The Sacramento Superior Court said the issue affected jurors scheduled to appear between November 17 and 21.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Sacramento County resident Tony Cox was surprised when an email told him he needed to report for jury duty, even though he never received a summons in the mail.
Cox saw the message in his inbox on a Saturday morning and told him to appear on Monday.
“It said, here is a reminder to report to jury duty Monday morning,” said Cox. “Less than 48 hours. That has never happened. I thought it was a scam.”
Cox said he never received the required jury summons through the U.S. Postal Service, and when he posted about it online, friends agreed it seemed questionable. He called the Sacramento Superior Court on Monday to ask if the email was legitimate.
“The associate on the phone said we have had a few calls saying they received the same thing and it is not a scam,” he said.
During that call, Cox said he was told what may have caused the confusion.
“They said we had a third-party vendor who may have not sent out the USPS summons in advance two-week notice,” he said.
In a statement to ABC10, the Sacramento Superior Court said the issue affected jurors scheduled to appear between November 17 and 21. Here is the full statement:
“Late last week, based on standard monitoring practices, our Jury Services staff noticed lower-than-expected juror engagement for this week’s juror cohort. In response, staff proactively contacted the court’s jury summons service contractor to confirm the status of the summons scheduled for this week.
The jury summons service, which has worked with the court for more than a decade, as well as other courts throughout the state, informed us that, according to their records, the summons for this week had been delivered to the U.S. Postal Service. They are currently working to obtain and provide tracking information to verify the delivery to the Postal Service. However, because the juror engagement levels were atypical, the matter is being actively reviewed to ensure that all summons were properly processed and delivered.
In light of the atypical engagement, the court proactively reached out, via email, to the jurors who were summoned to appear this week to confirm their appearance was required. For those jurors who indicated to the court that they did not receive a summons and were not available, their services have been rescheduled.”
Cox said he’s never experienced anything like this before.
“In all my years, I have never had an email confirmation. I always gotten the summons through the mail,” he said. “What’s going on. Let me know. I will be standing by.”
WATCH MORE ON ABC10 | Funding crisis hits federal defense teams: no travel, no experts, no pay
ABC10: Watch, Download, Read