The federal judiciary released new model jury instructions (PDF) this week aimed at deterring jurors from using social media while they're hearing a case.
As reported by sibling publication the New Jersey Law Journal, the guidelines can be used in civil or criminal trials. The model instructions explicitly warn jurors against using sites such as Twitter or Facebook to look up information about a case, or to communicate about it.
The instructions were crafted by the Federal Judicial Center, at the request of the Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management, in response to a national survey of federal trial judges that found most are concerned about jurors' social media use and have acted to guard against it.
The full story is available on the New Jersey Law Journal's website.
The instructions are straight forward and reasonable. Jurors are just as addicted to their smart phones as the lawyers who are conducting the trials. The fact that the model instructions consist of less than two pagers is a definite plus. In my experience any time the jurors are not sitting on their case they are busily engaged with their phones. Most of the time, their usage of their phones has nothing to do with the case they are sitting on. Yet, how can you determine if a juror is not following the model rules? No attorney wants to violate a juror’s perceived rights to privacy to peer into their social media pages. Getting caught with nothing to show for it could prove very embarrassing for legal counsel.
Posted by: Paul Jones | August 23, 2012 at 02:36 PM