Reporter Amy Fenton was selected to carry out jury service at Preston Crown Court for two weeks - here she lifts the lid on what it's really like
When I opened my letter informing me I had been randomly selected to do jury service I was initially quite excited and felt privileged that I had been picked to carry out what is considered to be a great public duty.
I found a quieter area of chairs and over the next couple of hours found myself sat with a bunch of people who would, over the course of the following 10 days, become my friends. We laughed when we spotted the cupboard piled high with jigsaws - the same jigsaws myself and a fellow juror would later complete four of in order to deal with the mind-numbing boredom. Because let me tell you, if you don't get picked, there's a LOT of that.
You could choose soup and chips, soup and bread, a sandwich, wrap or toastie and you could also then pick three hot drinks or snacks. Every day the very friendly canteen staff would deliver a brown paper bag to your chair containing vouchers which you could redeem whenever you wanted during the day. It's strictly forbidden for jurors to ever discuss what happens in the course of a jury deliberating - making a decision of guilty or not guilty. But it's fair to say that the responsibility which comes with it is something which played heavily on my conscience.