Increasing Importance of Social Network Profiling
March 5, 2010
Ex-parte information obtained by internet searches, juror blogs and other social network communication
through sites like Twitter and Facebook have resulted in mistrials and appeals from jury verdicts in the
recent months.
In Miami, a juror sent out a number of tweets on Twitter describing deliberation experiences, including
one that stated they were “giving away $12 million of someone else’s money.” In another case a mistrial
was declared after the judge was told that a Blackberry was used to look up information about the criminal
defendant, including criminal records and media reports on the case. The judge in this case discovered
that 8 of the jurors all had done some kind of internet search on the case with complete disregard
for juror instructions.
Paula Hannaford-Agor, the director of the Center for Jury Studies at the National Center for State Courts
stated in The Court Manager “Examples of juror misconduct via technology have become so widespread
and alarming that a new expression has developed to describe the problem: Google mistrials.”
She goes on to say that the misconduct of jurors doing independent searches on the internet are twofold:
“jurors may use the Internet to obtain ex parte information about the case without the knowledge of
the court or trial counsel , and jurors may violate the privacy of jury deliberations by communicating with
outsiders.”
A private investigator working with a trial lawyer should monitor the social networks on jurors, witnesses
and other court personnel for potential threats to the client’s case before, during and after a trial for any
misconduct or other issues. There are several tools available to help with social network monitoring like
Spokeo.com, Tweetdeck, etc. A blog or forum tracker is also recommended for a complete profiling.
In preparing an online profile report for a case it is recommended that you separate and clearly define
the accurate information from the mis-information about a person, company or product that may exist in
search results.
With close to 1 Billion people active on social networks, online profiling research and reporting is expected
to be the fastest growing area of expertise for Private Investigators this year.
Article originally published in the Informant
Sources: Jury News http://ww.ncsonline.org/D_Research/cjs/JuryNews2009Vol24No2.pdf
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