A member of the jury in a criminal court case caused a mistrial and got a hefty $1,000 fine after sharing trial details on social media.
It generally goes without saying that members of the jury involved in a trial should not discuss the details of the case. One woman, however, not only disclosed details of an ongoing trial, but she did so on Facebook.
Queens juror Kimberly Ellis is reportedly so used to sharing stuff on Facebook that she didn't think twice about the consequences of posting details of the trial she was hearing. Ellis was apparently "dying from boredom" during the trial so she took to Facebook to complain about it.
The whole thing happened back in September, when Ellis served as a jury member for the very first time.
"Everything about this process is inefficient," Ellis posted on her Facebook account last Sept. 17, as the New York Daily News reports. "I'm trying to remain positive and centered but, truthfully, I'm dying from boredom."
The juror kept posting Facebook updates on the trial even after the jury started deliberating, and she went as far as to offer details of the ongoing process.
"God help me," Ellis complained in a Facebook post. "The other jurors don't trust the police and want to outright dismiss the confessions as well as the majority of the rest of the evidence. Tomorrow is going to be a very difficult day."
As it turned out, a former federal and Brooklyn District Attorney's Office prosecutor was friends on Facebook with Ellis and, upon seeing the inappropriate posts, she reported the blabbing juror.
After facing the wrath of the Queens District Attorney's Office and being slapped with a $1,000 fine over her utter lack of discretion, Ellis apologized and reckoned that her conduct was reckless.
"I continued my personal life as if I was not there to judge a trial," Ellis explained to the NY Daily News. "It was my first time as a juror, and I was naive."
The oversharing juror further acknowledged that she was fully aware she was not allowed to blab about the case, yet she ignored the instructions. Her actions led to a mistrial, wasting several people's time, not to mention incurring unnecessary costs.
If there's a time and a place for sharing things on social media, a criminal court case is definitely not it. Facebook oversharing has raised plenty of concerns in the past, but this incident takes it to a whole new level.
