A juror who documented her boredom and intimate details of the trial she was hearing has been fined, after the case resulted in a mistrial.
Kimberly Ellis was sitting as a juror on a robbery case from 2014, when she decided to update her Facebook status from the courtroom.
In the first post, Ellis wrote:
“Everything about this process is inefficient. I’m trying to remain positive and centered but, truthfully, I’m dying from boredom.”
She soon followed this update with more specific items relating to the case:
“God help me, 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.”
Image: i100/ Kimberly Ellis Facebook
According to i100, the posts were spotted by one of Ellis’ Facebook friends – who was a former District Attorney’s Office prosecutor. They then alerted authorities to the running commentary happening online.
After Ellis was removed from the jury, there were only 11 jurors and no alternates, resulting in a mistrial.
When Ellis appeared before a Supreme Court Judge, she explained her actions as she ‘wasn’t thinking clearly’:
“Well, I sometimes — I suppose I forget it’s so public and it’s Facebook and it’s something that I use a lot, and I’m pretty quiet in my day-to-day dealings with people, so it’s just a way for me to, you know, express myself.”
The judge fined Ellis $1,000 for her actions, reminding her that she had wasted thousands of taxpayers’ money.
Apologising for her actions, the mum of two said:
“I failed to make the necessary changes in my daily life.
“I feel terrible. I never meant to hurt anyone. I wasted a lot of people’s time and money, and I deeply regret what I did.”
