A Denver woman has been charged with perjury after a judge heard her admit on a local talk show that she had worn offbeat clothes and pretended to be mentally ill to get out of jury duty in the judge’s court last summer, KUSA-TV reports.
Susan Cole, 57, was dismissed after showing up for jury selection in hair curlers, wearing mismatched shoes, reindeer socks and a T-shirt reading, “Ask me about my best seller.”
In October, Cole, using a pseudonym, told of the ploy in a call to KOA’s Dave Logan show, saying she had been emotionally upset that morning and also had “too much on my platter” to serve on a jury.
According to a court transcript of jury selection, Cole was dismissed after telling the court she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and “get very confused in the morning when I try to get ready.”
“Her makeup looked like something you would wear during a theater performance,” Kelli Wessels, the court reporter that day, said in a statement to investigators. “When the judge asked the entire panel if anyone had a mental illness, (Cole) stated she had difficulties getting ready in the morning, which was apparent to me by the way she was dressed.”
Unfortunately for Cole, the judge who had presided over court that day heard the program, remembered the incident, and turned Cole in.
In an interview with KUSA-TV, Cole admits she “deliberately dressed in a disheveled and uncoordinated fashion” to get out of jury duty.
“I am embarrassed I did it,” she says. “I didn’t mean to harm the judge. I really felt bad she interpreted this.”
Cole also says she is anxious about facing court as a defendant, not a prospective juror: “I just think: What if I go to prison over this?”
