Friday, June 23, 2017

Allowing Any Device in the Jury Deliberation Room Is a Bad Idea

In the Arizona case linked below the trial court allowed a court laptop in the deliberation room for the jury to review certain evidence admitted at trial.  Unfortunately there was a "witness interviews" disk also in the laptop disk drive, evidence not admitted at trial.  The jurors saw the disk but did not view it and contacted the bailiff immediately.  No mistrial was ordered by the trial court and this decision was affirmed.  No harm, no foul.  Still a very bad idea.  I am only familiar with MN procedure where this would not have been allowed.


http://www.azcourts.gov/Portals/0/OpinionFiles/Div1/2017/1%20CA-CR%2016-0240.pdf

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