Around 1989 I was working at a place that sold manufactured homes, and for several days I had to take off work because I was called to grand jury.  I wasn’t looking forward to it, but I had no way out.

The first day I arrived at the Court House, I was met with other people in a large room sitting around a conference table.  We were instructed to attend an introduction to meet the jurors, receive information on what our duties were, and what hours and days we would need to attend.  When the court person was done with his jury instructions, he asked if anyone wanted to volunteer to be the foreperson .  We all sat there glancing at each other, waiting for someone to speak up.  When no spoke up, I raised my hand and said, “I’ll do it.”  As soon as those words came out of my mouth, I was stunned, thinking to myself, “Why did I do that?”  It was totally not like me to make such bold decisions, but once those words jumped out, it was too late to change my mind.  The man thanked me, and the others did too.

The first day of jury duty I arrived early that morning and went to the room we were instructed to go.  Before anything began to happen, a District Attorney came in to meet us all.  After he sat down and introduced himself, he began to tell us what was on the agenda for that day, and each day he would inform us of what case we had.  As the days began it was swearing in one witness after another for testimony.  At the end of each day we would deliberate.  Most of the time we found the accused worthy of indictment.  I was responsible for signing the indictments and hand carrying them to the District Attorneys office, where I already knew a few DA’s from a prior case involving my little girl, though, I didn’t know the DA who sat in the room with the jurors.

After a few days, I was in full swing.  I had the swearing in process memorized as the words just flowed out of my mouth, until one witness stunned me ... and I suddenly froze.  That day we had several short cases.  The last case involved a drug possession.  The one and only witness was the arresting police officer.  The arrested man had pleaded not guilty, accusing the officer of planting the drugs in his vehicle.  The officer was there to deny that claim, and give testimony of the incident.  We were supposed to decide if the man should be indicted, and we found the case merited an indictment.  It really was the accused words or the officers words ... everyone, except myself was in agreement ... though, I went along with the majority’s vote.

When the officer entered the room, I stood up to swear him in.  We stood about six feet from each other, face to face.  I asked him to raise his right hand, and he did.  I then proceeded to swear him in.  His fingers were pointing straight up, as each witness had done before, but when I got the final words, “Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help …,” and before I could say “you God,” he suddenly dropped his two middle fingers, folding his thump across them, and flashed what I knew to be the sign of Satan.  I knew it well from my studies of Satanism during the time my youngest daughter was haunted by demons, a time of darkness that led me to such knowledge.

The moment he did that ... as our eyes were locked ... I felt the most powerful force slam into my body like someone just punched me so hard it felt like my body was shoved outside myself and hit the wall about 8 feet behind me.  In that moment, I froze, as my words ceased.  For a moment I felt in a daze until I heard my fellow jurors giggle, thinking it was funny, and I heard one say, “She forgot the words.”  I suddenly snapped out the daze when I felt my body return, and I looked at the jurors and the DA, who were looking at me in bewilderment, and I apologized.  When I turned back to the officer, his eyes were focused to the floor.  The DA said to just pick up where I left off, and so with the officers fingers straight up, his eyes still focused downward, I repeated the last words, “... so help you God?” where mumbled under his breath, just loud enough to barely hear him, “I do.” 

The DA asked him to sit down as the jurors began asking him questions, I starred at the officer thinking in my mind that I was rebuking him.  I could sense his eerie vibes radiating around him, prepared to face the devil eye to eye, but the entire time he sat there he not once looked at me, even when it was my turn to ask questions.  He looked at everyone else, yet, he just wouldn’t look at me.  After he and the DA left, I asked the other jurors if they saw the sign he flashed during my swearing in.  Some said they had and thought it was odd, some said they weren’t watching, while one man said it was the Texas longhorn sign.  I corrected him and told the group it was actually the devil’s hand sign.  They all looked shocked.  I realized while running the experience through my thoughts, that what the officer was trying to do is swear to his god, not the God those words are meant for.

At the end of the day, I went down to the District Attorney’s office to turn in the paperwork and when I was walking along the  hallway toward the exit, I was approached by the DA who sat in the room with us.  He asked if he could talk to me for a moment.  The first thing he asked was what made me freeze during the swearing in of the officer, since I had been performing perfectly.  I told him exactly what happened, briefly explaining my prior experience with such things.  The look on his face was amazement and he told me that officer was under investigation of belonging to a local satanic group that they have been keeping an eye on, and that the officer was under suspicion of planting drugs in several arrest cases.  They just couldn’t get enough evidence to suspend him.  He asked me if I would be willing to speak to the judge and give my testimony, in which I said I would.

A few days later the grand jury duty was finished and I was back to work, when I got a call one afternoon shortly thereafter.  It was one of the judges who thanked me for coming forward, then took my testimony, assuring me that I was very helpful in their investigation.  A couple weeks later I heard from the DA, he called to let me know that the officer was suspended and if found guilty he would be removed from the force.  He thanked me once again for my courage and honesty.