Jurors Cause Trouble By Friending Each Other On Facebook, Using Wikipedia For Research

from the no-friending-allowed dept

We've discussed numerous court cases where modern technology has caused significant procedural problems from "the old ways" of doing things. CitMediaLaw points us to a story that includes two more cases, both in Maryland. In one, lawyers are seeking a new trial because some of the jurors became Facebook "friends" during the trial. This follows on the news that Florida is forbidding judges from friending lawyers on social networking sites, but is it reasonable to prevent jurors from friending each other? For many Facebook users, "friending" people you meet is quite natural and something you do almost immediately upon meeting someone new. So it should be no surprise that some jurors would choose to quickly friend each other. It's hard to see how that would make the results of the jury verdict suspect, however.

The second case involved jurors using Wikipedia to look up some terms. This is hardly a new concept. Some judges these days are specifically warning jurors not to use the internet to look up anything related to a case, but for a generation of folks who consider internet research to be an adjunct part of the thinking process, it's not hard to recognize why many would ignore this, and not think they're doing anything wrong (and they might have a good argument). The real question is whether or not there are reasonable ways to change the way the jury system works to allow for what many people consider perfectly natural: doing additional research on their own. For those who are comfortable with the old system, this may seem like a horrific idea (and yes, we all understand the reasons why the current system wants to limit things to just what's said in the courtroom). However, at some point the system may need to recognize that an artificial constraint on learning about the details of the case may not actually be the best system.

Filed Under: friending, jurors, jury, research, social networks
Companies: facebook, wikipedia

RIAA Claims Jammie Thomas Jury Is A Representative Sample Of Views On File Sharing

from the wow,-that's-chutzpah dept

After the Jammie Thomas verdict came down, I predicted that the RIAA would "gloat about and misrepresent to its own advantages." Within hours, I was attacked by a former entertainment industry lawyer with a long screed claiming that no one from the RIAA misinterpreted or gloated about it at the trial. Except, of course, I wasn't talking about what they said as they walked out of the courtroom. I was talking about what would happen afterwards... like a few days later on the RIAA blog. That's when the RIAA tried to claim that the Jammie Thomas jury provides a representative sample of "music industry outsiders" whose verdict disproves the theories of certain "pundits" who believe the digital economy should be a "new wild west" where "the rule of law" is not obeyed.

Talk about misrepresenting.

First of all, I don't know of many "pundits" who think that the digital economy should be a new wild west at all. I think that many of them are actually just focused on preserving individual rights against a constant landgrab by an industry whose history has shown it to not be above removing right after right after right from people. The RIAA and its supporters have taken content out of the public domain, making a government go back on a bargain it struck with content creators, much to the detriment of society, but very much to the benefit of a few record label execs and their lobbyists and lawyers. That's stealing from the public. It's taking a bargain and changing the terms. People don't want a wild west. They want the culture we were promised, and they want their individual freedoms.

Furthermore, calling the very specific nature of the Jammie Thomas trial a referendum on file sharing is ridiculous. Her case had a very specific set of circumstances unlike many others -- and even we (a "reliable critic" according to the RIAA) felt that she never should have gone to trial, as the evidence against her seemed strong. On top of that, this "sample" involved RIAA lawyers who had years to prepare the case against some rookie lawyers who were brought on the case just weeks earlier with little preparation at all, and who, frankly, did a terrible job, seemingly more focused on other issues than the key points in the case.

The Jammie Thomas trial was not a referendum on "the rule of law" or on "file sharing" or on the future of music business models. It was a referendum on Jammie Thomas, who presented herself as an incredibly questionable witness with a fair amount of circumstantial evidence that she broke the law and then tried to avoid taking responsibility for her actions. If the RIAA wants to believe that the people are behind its self-destructive campaign of suing people, more power to it, but putting its head in the sand hasn't worked for the last decade, and I doubt it'll start working now.

Filed Under: file sharing, jammie thomas, jury, sample
Companies: riaa

Canadian Insurance Company Snooped On Jurors Insurance Claims During Trial

from the that-seems-bad dept

We've seen it over and over again -- when people have access to large databases of information, it's almost impossible for them to resist the temptation to abuse the info. The latest example comes via Michael Scott, who points us to the news that the Insurance Corporation of B.C. (ICBC) was caught checking its own database to examine the claim histories of potential jurors in a trial in which the company was involved. Not surprisingly, this is a massive breach of Canadian privacy laws and also raises questions about the jury itself. The judge in the case is now trying to find out if ICBC has done this in other cases as well. ICBC seems to be bending over backwards to say this won't happen again and that it's put in place safeguards, but it's not clear why it happened in the first place.

Filed Under: canada, insurance, jury, snooping
Companies: icbc

Judge Denies Appeal Based On Juror's Twitter Messages

from the @arklawyer-nice-try,-but-no dept

The legal world is catching on to social media in a pretty big way. Status updates and other messages are commonly cited as evidence, while there's growing concern over jurors' use of Twitter and other services on their mobile phones during trials. In one case, lawyers in Arkansas argued that a juror's tweets showed he was predisposed against their client, and wanted a verdict that would "impress his audience." They appealed the decision against their client based on the juror's 140-character missives, and a judge has now rejected the appeal and let the judgment stand. He said the juror's tweets were in bad taste, but didn't constitute improper conduct. While it doesn't seem like the messages in question reflected any predisposition on the part of the juror, this is likely just the tip of the iceberg of these types of cases, particularly with the definitively unanswered question of whether posting messages to social-networking sites during deliberations breaks jury rules regarding non-disclosure.

Filed Under: jury, twitter
Companies: twitter

Lawyers Use Juror's Twitter Messages As Basis For Appeal

from the reaching dept

Lawyers for an Arkansas building materials firm have appealed a $12.6 million judgment against the company, alleging that a juror's Twitter messages show that he was biased against the company. The lawyers say tweets like "I just gave away TWELVE MILLION DOLLARS of somebody else's money" and "oh and nobody buy Stoam. Its bad mojo and they'll probably cease to Exist, now that their wallet is 12m lighter" illustrate that the juror was predisposed towards a verdict that would "impress his audience". Meanwhile, in a corruption case in Philadelphia, a defandant's attorneys allege a juror's tweets and status updates broke rules about disclosing deliberations, and say they could warrant a mistrial. Lawyers, along with everybody else, are paying more and more attention to social-media updates, so it's likely we've not heard the last of the silly Twitter-based legal maneuver. But it's not just the information-spreading that's got lawyers and judges worried, it's also juries looking up info on their phones during trials. In a recent federal drug trial in Florida, a judge declared a mistrial after learning that 8 jurors had accessed online information on their mobile phones during a trial. A cornerstone of the US' adversarial legal system is that juries can only consider the evidence that's presented to them, and jurors looking info up on their own breaks the longstanding rules of evidence of the system. It's not as if the legal system is under threat from technology, but certainly expect to see plenty more stories along these lines in the near future.

Filed Under: appeal, jury, twitter

If You're On A Jury, You Probably Shouldn't Ask Your Facebook Friends For Their Guilty/Not Guilty Votes

from the just-a-suggestion dept

Apparently, a woman in the UK came up with a rather novel approach to "crowdsourcing," when she used Facebook to ask her friends how they would vote in a criminal case for which she was on the jury. Not surprisingly, using Facebook in this manner got her kicked off the jury pretty quickly. Of course, I would guess this isn't the best way to get out of jury duty either, as I'd imagine such a stunt would put you at risk of getting charged with contempt of court as well.

Filed Under: crowdsourced, jury, poll, social network
Companies: facebook

Lori Drew's Lawyers Worried About Finding Jury That Hasn't Prejudged Drew

from the tough-case dept

With the judge agreeing that the information about Megan Meier's suicide can be included in the computer fraud lawsuit against Lori Drew, Drew's lawyers are discovering that the emotional aspects of the case may be difficult to get past. In fact, in reviewing questionnaires that potential jurors were asked to fill out, many expressed outright disgust and "viciousness" for Drew. Once again, it's becoming increasingly clear, that it will be impossible for Drew to get a fair hearing on what the case is actually about: whether or not it's a violation of computer fraud and hacking laws to break the terms of service for an online service. Instead, people are focusing on Meier's suicide, which has absolutely nothing to do with the actual charges. This is a witch hunt appealing to emotional responses, rather than reasoned ones. It's been rather depressing to see how many folks have no problem abusing the law in this manner. If the lynch mob aspect of this case is allowed to go on, it will eventually be looked back on as a mockery of the law.

Filed Under: computer fraud, evidence, jury, lori drew, megan meier

RIAA May Have A Pretty Strong Case

from the some-evidence-is-sticking dept

Lots of folks are paying plenty of attention to the first RIAA lawsuit to go to a jury trial. Initially the reports were that the defendant's case was strong, and the RIAA didn't have very much evidence. In fact, the RIAA's star technical witness has been debunked before, and it appears that many of his claims were once again debunked in the court room. However, even with such weak technical evidence, I have to agree with Tim Lee that this sounds like the RIAA has a pretty strong case, based on the combination of the IP address and the username in Kazaa. It's the identical username that the woman uses for many, many different online accounts -- making it tough to believe that someone else happened to be using that same username from an IP address assigned to her account. It also seems highly questionable that the woman would claim she never had Kazaa with that kind of evidence. There are still some legal questions here -- including whether or not the court will instruct the jury that simply making content available is copyright infringement. However, it's disappointing that this is the case that's going to trial, because it certainly looks like the RIAA has stronger evidence than usual in this particular case. Despite what some people think my position is on the issue of unauthorized sharing, I absolutely do not condone it (nor partake in unauthorized sharing). I think the laws covering this type of thing tend to do more damage than good to the very industry it's supposed to help -- but that doesn't mean people should be free to ignore them. I also think the RIAA is making a dumb business decision with these lawsuits and that it often accuses people without much real evidence. However, even with the flimsy technical evidence, the combination of other factors certainly makes this look like a much stronger case from the RIAA's side. That's unfortunate, because if the RIAA does win, more people will assume it legitimizes their lawsuit strategy and even supports their other cases where the evidence is a lot weaker. Perhaps I'm missing something, but it's difficult to see how this case was a good one to fight the RIAA on.

Filed Under: copyright, jury, lawsuit
Companies: riaa

First RIAA Lawsuit To Face A Jury

from the so-how-will-a-jury-of-your-peers-feel? dept

The RIAA didn't want it to come to this, but one of its lawsuits accusing someone of sharing unauthorized content is about to go to a jury trial. As Ray Beckerman notes, it's not a particularly good trial for the RIAA (which partly explains their desire to avoid the whole jury thing). There's no evidence that the defendant infringed copyrights, and the supposed expert witness the RIAA is expected to call has been thoroughly debunked as an expert. Of course, juries can be very tough to predict, and you can bet that the RIAA will appeal to the emotional angle of "stolen" music. If it's worked on politicians, perhaps they'll find a gullible jury as well.

Filed Under: copyright, jury, lawsuit
Companies: riaa