Recently, I received a juror summons from Michelle Flesher, El Paso County Jury Commissioner, requesting my presence at the El Paso Combined Court, 270 South Tejon, Jury Room 113.

She informed me that I should “be prepared to serve at least one full day, or, if selected for a trial, the duration of the trial,” and that “the average length of a jury trial is three days.”

Last Monday, I dutifully complied.

If one seeks solitude, one would do well to avoid the El Paso County Judicial Complex at 8 a.m. on a Monday morning. Arriving, I queued up at the end of a block-long serpentine line and wiggled my way to the front door.

Once inside, security was comfortingly tight. After passing inspection, I headed to Jury Room W113: a cavernous space with a sea of chairs to accommodate 400 prospective jurors. When I arrived, half the chairs were occupied. After completing the 27 items on the jury questionnaire, all the seats were taken.

The questionnaire was a mini vita with several open-ended questions, concluding with the query, “Any comments you feel are important?” to which I responded, “Thank God for our legal system and the existence of juries.”

Minutes later, a voice over a loud speaker called out my name directing me to appear in a line that was forming for a criminal trial in District 4, presided over by Judge Scott A. Sells.

The jury pool to which I was assigned numbered 40. After two hours of voir dire (speak the truth) — questioning by the opposing attorneys and the judge — I was selected to serve on a twelve-person panel.

The defendant, a man in his early 30s, was charged with committing two crimes of identity theft: using the corporate debit card of a relative (and his former employer).

The defendant contended his employer, who had recently fired him, owed him $1,450 and in lieu of paying that amount, both agreed the defendant could use his employer’s debit card to pay bills.

The defendant’s employer insisted that he agreed to no such arrangement, and after learning of the “missing” funds, he contacted his bank, which in turn notified the Colorado Springs police, who without interviewing the defendant, arrested him.

On the stand, the defendant’s employer was unable or unwilling to provide the court with any documentation refuting he owed the defendant $1,450.

The defendant didn’t help his cause by being unable or unwilling to provide the court any documentation in his defense.

Under oath, the employer’s bank representative admitted that after notifying the Colorado Springs police, she did not follow up on the investigation.

The Colorado Springs police officer handling the case testified that given his caseload of 400 to 450 fraud cases every year, after notifying the court of the alleged crime, he didn’t speak to the defendant, or pursue the case further.

At the conclusion of the trial, before entering the jury room to deliberate the defendant’s legal fate, Judge Sells, a knowledgeable and avuncular presence on and off the bench, provided each jury member 19 pages of instructions, in which we were reminded that “every person charged with a crime is presumed innocent,” and that “the burden of proof is upon the prosecution to prove to the satisfaction of the jury beyond a reasonable doubt the existence of all of the elements necessary to constitute the crime charged.”

Retiring to the jury room, each member of the jury offered an opinion as to the defendant’s guilt or innocence. Eleven of us indicated that we either leaned or stood erect on the defendant being innocent of both counts. At first blush, the 12th juror, a college student who had recently been the victim of identity fraud, was not entirely convinced of the defendant’s innocence.

As we went around the table for a second time, it was universally decided that grasping for the truth in this trial was like trying to sculpt the scales of justice out of mercury. Irrefutable truths were few, reasonable doubts were many, and ultimately, the prosecutor was unable to convince us “beyond a reasonable doubt” of the defendant’s guilt, and we found him innocent on both counts.

Returning to the jury room to gather our belongings and say good bye to one another, more than a few of us wondered why this case came to trial given the paucity of evidence and the less-than-thorough investigation on the part of the state.

Ah, sweet mystery of life — in and out of court.

Todd Tarbox, author of several books including “Orson Welles and Roger Hill: A Friendship in Three Acts,” lives in Colorado Springs.