The ethics and art of investigation the jury panel.
In April 2014, the American Bar Association issued Formal Opinion 466 in which they found that investigating potential jurors via social media is ethical, provided lawyers and their teams do not contact or connect with potential jurors in the process.
In our opinion, social media jury investigations – when performed properly – are not just ethical, but a critical part of a trial lawyer’s responsibility as a zealous advocate. There are clear advantages to researching potential jurors, and there are liabilities inherent in a failure to investigate. In 2015, social media jury investigations should be considered part of the standard of care in voir dire. That said, it’s important to balance the benefit against the effort required to conduct social media jury investigations.
