Fumo Juror Microblogged Trial, Deliberations

Updated Information Below.

CBS3 is reporting that Democrat Vince Fumo's lawyers are considering the push for a mistrial, following the discovery that at least one juror may have been discussing the case with the wonderful world of web 2.0.

Former Pennsylvania State Senator Vincent Fumo is awaiting the decision of a jury in his corruption trial. 30 years of Senate service and an alleged $3.5M of other peoples' money later, the former statesman retired earlier this month.

Accused of stealing from a charity, using his state staff for personal purposes and destroying evidence, he faces over 100 counts. His trial, which started in October of last year, has been costing taxpayers almost $9,000 a day, according to numbers aired by WHYY.

And now the defense is asking the judge to interview one or more jurors who have allegedly been updating their Facebook and Twitter statuses based on the progress of the trial and deliberations.

The defense's logic is that if the juror has been feeding information into their microblogs, then they may have been on the receiving end of any number of various and sundry responses, potentially sullying their impartiality (assuming we're allowing for the highly unlikely state of impartiality each juror is supposed to be in when a trial starts...).

Right now, the motion only requests the interviews. But, based on those interviews, they might push for the removal of one or more jurors, and maybe even a mistrial. In light of things like private messages on Facebook and direct messages on Twitter, it's impossible to know how many responses the juror received, and how they may have influenced his or her thinking on the trial.

But this story also poses a deeper question: how will the legal system deal with the implications of web 2.0, in which information transfer is instantaneous or damn near, and in which, even when people delete controversial postings (as this juror has already done, according to the Daily News), those messages can live on in the host service's servers almost indefinitely?

UPDATE: While writing this post, we noticed that City Paper is reporting that the motion described below was thrown out by Judge Ronald L. Buckwalter, and that it will likely be grounds for the defense's appeal. We also noticed, on the Fumo Live Blog, that the jury has concluded that Fumo and his co-defendant, Ruth Arnao, are both guilty on all counts. Every juror agreed with the guilty verdict on every count. Court is adjourned until 2:00PM.

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Image via Flickr user tanguero (BLOCK, rinse, repeat).