Txting A Judge's Patience

By Erin in News on Sep 9, 2005 12:22PM

Chicagoist has never served on a jury so we can only imagine what a mind-numbing inconvenience it is, even with the sexiest of cases. However, we're not so sure even we can condone a juror whipping out a cell phone and texting away.

But it seems just that happened during the Ryan Harris civil trial with two members of the jury text messaging each other as court was in sesson. Now city attorneys want the jurors tossed and the attorney representing the family of the 15-year-old boy wrongfully arrested for the 1998 murder of the 11-year-old Harris are accusing the city of "dumping jurors because of their race," which, according to the Sun-Times, was a sentiment made during the selection process.

The two offenders, who were ratted out by someone anonymously, just couldn't keep still long enough to not furiously work their thumbs to the bone to send all-too-important messages such as "hi, I'm here" and "who was here earlier." The Cook County Sheriff's office is looking into the matter to see if the two, perhaps, were making plans for a hot rendezvous later or maybe making fun of juror #4's horrendous shirt, the one with the monkeys on it, and OMG! Did U C her hair 2day?

Or maybe not. At any rate, It doesn't look as though the two were discussing the trial.

The judge presiding over the case will decide today whether to stop the trial until all of the text messages have been retrieved and all jurors have been instructed not to use their cell phones.