TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Brittany Sims on Apr 24, 2014

Lawyers may look up jurors or potential jurors on the Internet and social media, but they may not communicate directly with them — such as asking to “friend” them on Facebook. According to Formal Opinion 466 issued today by the ABA Standing Committee in Ethics and Professionalism, lawyers may pick through the troves of public information that jurors put on the Internet about themselves. “'The mere act of observing’ is not improper ex parte conduct, much as driving down a juror’s street to get a sense of his or her environs isn’t,” the ABA Journal reports.