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Jury Duty and Witness Leave in California

Jury service and a witness subpoena are protected time off. This protection is broader than the five-employee line on some other poster items.

General education for California employees—not legal advice. Your facts and deadlines control. This is not a Workplace Rights Advocacy case result. It explains the Civil Rights Department workplace notice in plain English. It is not the poster and it is not a complete statement of every exception.

Jury service

Government Code § 12945.8(a)(1) says an employer shall not discharge or otherwise discriminate against an employee for taking time off to serve as required by law on an inquest jury or trial jury. For this section, an employer includes a person who employs one or more people and includes public employers. Reasonable advance notice is required when notice is feasible.

The statute does not itself require the employer to pay wages for jury service. The employee may use vacation, personal leave, paid sick leave, or compensatory time that is otherwise available. A contract, policy, or local rule may require pay even when the statute does not.

Witness testimony

The same statute prohibits discharge, discrimination, or retaliation because an employee who is a victim takes time off to appear in court under a subpoena or other court order as a witness. For the witness provision, a victim includes a person against whom any crime was committed. If the absence could not be scheduled in advance, the employer cannot punish the employee when, within a reasonable time, the employee provides a certification the employer requests. A court order or a document showing the employee appeared is one form of certification.

Time off to seek a restraining order, or to attend other criminal proceedings, is covered on the crime-victim time off page.

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