«« older | newer »»

author photo

November 11, 2009

Michel-Adrien Sheppard

Should Twitter in the Courtroom Be Illegal?

A U.S. federal court in the state of Georgia has ruled that Rule 53 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure prohibits "tweeting" from the courtroom:

"The immediate result of the court's decision is to reject a request from a reporter for the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer that he be allowed to use his BlackBerry during the Shellnutt criminal case in order to send updates to his newspaper's Twitter feed."

This is exactly what Ottawa Citizen reporter Glen McGregor did during this year's bribery trial of Ottawa mayor Larry O’Brien.

This whole area of discussion (the impact of social networking media and Google in the courtroom) will be the topic of a panel at next year's annual conference of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL) in Windsor, Ontario.

I explained a bit more in an October 22, 2009 Library Boy post entitled Impartiality of Juries Threatened by Web?.


[click on the author's name for more information]

Respond: make a comment | read the 1 comment

Share: Email | Save as PDF | Print | Bookmark & Share | Clip to Evernote | Reader later on Instapaper

More: in Substantive Law | from

up

One Comment on “Should Twitter in the Courtroom Be Illegal?”

  1. Simon Chester says:
    November 12, 2009 at 9:32 am

    Note also the Manitoba QB decision involving the Winnipeg Free Press of Director of Child and Family Services v. D.M.P. et al, 2009 MBQB 193

SlawTips      

SlawTips Cash Flow Reports – Part 1
Thursday, May 17

Following on our earlier Top 10 Financial Errors posts, this is the first in a series of 10 posts dealing with Cash Flow Reports and in particular, cash flow management.… »»

Practice

SlawTips Just the Facts
Wednesday, May 16

Today’s research tip is about facts. When research is assigned to juniors (and librarians for that matter) it is important to share facts that are critical to the research. It … »»

Research

SlawTips Minimize That Darn Office Ribbon for More Room on Your Desktop
Wednesday, May 16

If you are using Office 2007 or 2010, The Ribbon is now a part of your life. Some of you will be happy about this – some of you won’t.… »»

Technology

noted on Slaw    

MLB Selected Case Summaries    

These summaries of selected recent cases are provided each week to Slaw by Maritime Law Book.
More information.
  • Harkat, Re 2012 FCA 122

    Aliens - Exclusion and expulsion - Power to detain and deport - Minister’s certificate - Review - Evidence

    In 2002, Harkat was detained pursuant to a ministerial security certificate issued under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) as a person inadmissible to Canada on grounds ...

  • Girouard v. Druet 2012 NBCA 40

    Contracts - Formation of contract - Signing - Electronic signature

    The plaintiff expressed an interest in purchasing the defendant’s (vendor’s) condo. The parties agreed to carry on their discussions through e-mail. Following an exchange of e-mails, the plaintiff claimed that the defendant was contractually bound to ...

  • Donell et al. v. GJB Enterprises Inc. et al. 2012 BCCA 135

    Barristers and Solicitors - Relationship with client - Confidential communications - General

    The petitioner was a Receiver appointed in March 2009 by a California court over the assets of GJB Enterprises Inc. (a “Ponzi scheme”) and its principals, the Berkes (the GJB parties). The court ordered ...

  • Dish Network L.L.C. et al. v. Rex et al. 2012 BCCA 161

    Practice - Costs - Funding before judgment - When interim or advance costs available

    The plaintiffs were “direct to home” satellite based subscription program providers. Rex and other defendants offered “grey market” services to Canadian residents to facilitate the unauthorized reception in Canada of the plaintiffs’ ...

TalkLaw/ParLoi    

This is a listing of a few upcoming events in Canada of interest to lawyers, law students, legal librarians, and others involved in the practice of law.

Clicking on any event in the list below will give you access to more information and to links allowing you to see the full entry and to add the event to your own calendar.

Click this link for a fuller version of the TalkLaw/ParLoi calendar of events and for instructions as to how to add events and calendars to your own calendar.