Colorado Advances Bill to Let Old People Opt Out of Jury Duty

Only nine states don't let senior citizens get out of jury duty because of old age. Colorado is one of them — but a proposal to change that is making progress in the State Legislature.

If passed into law, House Bill 25-1065 would allow Coloradans aged 72 and older to opt out of jury duty, temporarily or permanently, beginning in 2026. The bill cleared its final vote in the House of Representatives on Wednesday. Now, it's heading to the Senate for consideration.

"We have mandatory retirement for judges at the age of 72," bill sponsor Representative Bob Marshall said on Wednesday, April 30. "If a judge isn't even allowed to sit on the trial, why are we forcing these people over the age of 72 to come in [for jury duty] even if they don't want to?"

Right now, state law lets individuals summoned for jury duty be excused on a case-by-case basis for "serious physical or mental illness," though they must provide a doctor's note. Other accepted excuses include breastfeeding a child, being the sole caretaker of a permanently disabled person, or not being able to read, speak and understand English.

HB 1065 would let seniors remove themselves from the jury pool even before they are summoned. Marshall argues this would save time and effort on all sides; he says multiple senior citizens reached out to him explaining that it is a burden to get a doctor's note proving they are not well enough to serve.

State-level age exemptions for jury duty are offered in 41 states, ranging from as young as age 65 in Mississippi to as old as eighty in Maine, according to the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP).

The Colorado bill received broad bipartisan approval, passing the House in a 50-14 vote with one representative absent. However, all 23 of Colorado's district attorneys oppose the proposal, expressing concerns that letting senior citizens opt out will drastically decrease the state's jury pool.

"We'd be losing a significant number of people," Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty testified during a January committee hearing. "[Jurors] over seventy are some of the people with the greatest amount of life experience, knowledge and wisdom in our community."

That is particularly worrying for rural districts with smaller and older populations, critics argue.

"I've had juries in these rural jurisdictions, I've lost jurors because of calving season," Representative Michael Carter of Aurora said during a February committee hearing. "The fact that they're already having a hard time getting jurors is a problem for me."

Representative Carlos Barron, another sponsor of HB 25-1065, says his rural Fort Lupton community has a large senior population, but they themselves brought the idea for the bill to him. Barron's older constituents often struggle to find transportation to the courthouse or simply don't feel well enough to participate in jury duty, even if they don't suffer from a specific ailment that would exempt them, he says.

“It’s important for them to have the choice if they want to continue their jury duty service," Barron told Westword in January. “Jury duty is an important pillar to our judicial system. I am not against it at all. This is just a bill to help out the people who really need it."

Marshall alleges that district attorneys have ulterior motives for opposing the bill.

"The reason, of course, is older people convict at much, much higher rates so they want to keep the [older jurors] coming in," Marshall said on the House floor Wednesday. "But that shouldn't be a reason. That's actually another reason to consider [the opt out]. Is it really a jury of your peers if you have half the jury pool over the age of 72, and people who are eighteen to twenty getting convicted by these people?"

Under the bill, seniors aged 72 and older could temporarily remove themselves from the jury pool for one year at a time, after which they would automatically be reentered. Or they could permanently opt out — an action that could not be reversed.

The original bill also sought to provide exemptions for full-time students attending college out of state and people out of state for business, but those portions were removed in committee. Current law already lets anyone request to postpone a jury summons for up to six months for business, vacation and health conflicts.

The Senate has until the end of the legislative session on May 7 to take action on the bill.