We keep hearing about Baltimore's overloaded criminal docket -- how it leads to generous-looking plea deals for violent criminals, for instance, and how it's at the center of the city's problems with stemming crime in general. And didn't Mayor Dixon recently suggest that some of the city's courts go into night and weekend sessions to relieve all the pressure on the dockets?

Must not be so bad, after all. The administrative judge of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City doesn't think potential jurors -- the citizens of the city who have so much at stake in the quality of criminal justice -- be inconvenienced and annoyed with duty close to a holiday weekend.

Check this out: A July 19 memo from Judge Marcella A. Holland, the AJ,  to all active and retired judges.

"It has come to our attention that one of the aggravating things to jurors is to be summonsed, sit around and not be called to a courtroom," the memo  began.

(My comment: Such is life, your honor. It's a one-day-or-one-trial rule we've lived with for years. Sure it's annoying, but that's the system.)

"To help alleviate this on certain days, I have instructed the Jury Commissioner to cut the number of jurors called on 'light docket days.' That means on a day before a holiday weekend, or a major holiday, such as Veterans Day, Thanksgiving Day, and sometimes the day after major holidays if it falls on a Friday, she will only call enough jurors to handle misdemeanor cases and one-day civil cases.

"She will not call in enough jurors to allow anyone to start a felony trial.

"No one should start a felony trial the day before a long holiday weekend or before Thanksgiving or the last day of the Christmas holiday. It is counter productive not only to have jurors sitting around, but also jurors are angry because they have been brought in just before what is their holiday as well. There is plenty of work in chambers and in misdemneanor and civil, I am sure, to keep those few judges who are here on those busy days.

"Please do not yell or complain to Ms. Dennis because you cannot get a jury for a felony trial on those days, as she has been instructed to ignore you."

Great stuff. Great message. Just what we need -- even fewer days devoted to the criminal docket. Wouldn't want to inconvenience our fellow citizens who have their eyes on a three-day weekend.