Possible juror booted for Facebook post
Analyst for P&G compares being in pool to 'sitting in hell'
Kimball Perry • kperry@enquirer.com • January 31, 2009
So you want to keep your friends and family updated on all aspects of your life using online social networking?
Barry Price, 27, of Pleasant Ridge, did that on his Facebook page this week and it got him booted from jury duty on a prominent Hamilton County civil lawsuit and sparked an argument over whether the suit should be declared a mistrial.
"Barry Price is sitting in hell ... aka jury duty," Price wrote on his Facebook page Tuesday, information attorney Stan Chesley noted in an affidavit provided to Common Pleas Judge William Mallory.
Price, a systems analyst for Procter & Gamble, was one of a pool of potential jurors chosen to decide the outcome of a civil suit. In it, a worker is suing after he was severely injured during an incident at a rail yard when a pressurized rail car hatch blew off and hit him.
But when Chesley saw how Price viewed service as a juror on a lawsuit that could result in his client winning tens of millions of dollars - or nothing - Chesley asked the judge to remove Price from the pool. Mallory did.
When contacted Friday, Price was hesitated to talk about the incident. He said he couldn't remember what he had on his Facebook page three days earlier and said "I don't recall" why he was kicked off the jury pool. He said he was asked "some general questions" by lawyers in the case about his Facebook page contents but could "not specifically" remember what they were.
In one of the affidavits Chesley submitted to the judge, Chesley paralegal Theresa "Tracy" Combs wrote that Price's Facebook page was one of 238,000 that belong to the "Cincinnati, Ohio" network on Facebook. Price had his Facebook page set up so it could be viewed by others in that Cincinnati network as well as those in Procter & Gamble and Purdue University networks on Facebook.
Facebook notes it has 100 million users.
The judge booted Price from the jury pool and the attorneys representing the companies Chesley is suing asked for a mistrial. The judge refused.
"He has been removed from service," Mallory said of Price. "Let's move on, folks."
The case is expected to have a jury seated next week.