Heard Around the Courthouse

Rockdale Constitutional Corner

By Ruth A. Wilson

Clerk of Courts

We, in the Clerk of Courts Office, take great pride in offering high quality customer service each and every day. That requires us to be good listeners, to keep a good sense of humor and a positive outlook. Some days are harder than others, but we always smile and offer to help no matter what the issue is:

• Need to find a Notorious Republican so I can have some papers witnessed
• Where do I file this Affidavid?
• Is that down there where you file your Plack?
• Is the TPO still good now that my husband is dead?
• Lady wanted to be excused from Jury Duty because Traverse Jury Summonsused to be her neighbor.
• Somebody filed a Quick Claim Deed on my property.
• Lady needs the number for the former owner of the Chinese restaurant because the new owners do not make the General Tso’s Chicken right and she wants it fixed.
• Who is in charge of the river being low on water
• Lady asked the fees to file for divorce. When told, she asked to be transferred to the Lay Away Department
• Judge instructed jurors to check the Clerk’s website for instructions. Guy says, “No Sir, Your Honor, I don’t own a calculator.”

This is how rumors get started:

Judge was asking a panel of jurors if anyone was related by blood or marriage to the defendant. Juror raises his hand and Judge asks him to approach the bench. At the bench, the Judge asks the Juror how he is related to the defendant. With a straight face, the Juror says, “I think he is my son. I had an affair with his Mama.”

And finally:

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?

WITNESS: No.

ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?

WITNESS: No.

ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing?

WITNESS: No.

ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?

WITNESS: No.

ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?

WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.

ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless?

WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law.