The death sentence of Steven Hayes, a man convicted of killing a woman and her two daughters in their Cheshire, Conn., home in 2007, may be delayed for years.

Defense attorneys have filed appeals arguing the extreme use of Twitter for instant reporting swayed the jury and jeopardized Hayes’ rights to a fair trial, according to a New York Times article published Dec. 1.

More than 140,000 tweets containing details of the grim testimony, such as children tied to their beds in a burning house and rape, were sent by the end of the trial, according to the article.

Defense attorneys claim the instantaneous, widespread Twitter messages ignited public passion, swaying the jury. The trial judge, Jon Blue, said in a ruling at the end of November that there was no evidence suggesting the jury was driven by passion.

The episode has prompted questions about whether new rules are necessary to govern communication from the courtroom in light of new technologies.

The Daily Orange asks the experts, ‘Should journalists be allowed to use the media in the courtroom?’

Meet the expert: Joan Deppa, associate professor of mass communications in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications

‘Let us say if the jury was receiving the tweets, the judge can rule that they can’t do that. So it would not make sense to me to control or prevent the media from doing something, which is a technological issue, which is not that different from telling a jury that they cannot watch television or read the paper. The defense attorney is doing his job by grasping at straws.’

Meet the expert: Roy Gutterman, director of the Tully Center for Free Speech

‘Anything that happens in the courtroom is under a judge’s area of control. It is the judge’s responsibility to make sure the defendant gets a fair trial. In maintaining decorum in the courtroom, a judge has the right to keep cameras and phones out. The public has the right to know what goes on in the courtroom, and the public has changed the way they receive that information. If it is from social media that they trust, that is fine. Any juror that is found tweeting should be thrown off the jury and can be held in contempt of court. As long as journalists/reporters are not disrupting, distracting or interfering in any way, let the information be disseminated.’

Meet the expert: Martha Garcia-Murillo, associate professor in the School of Information Studies

‘If the court is screening and protecting the jury, does it need to be extended to Twitter or potentially to individuals who might be tweeting back? There are other elements that get into the picture. From anecdotal evidence, we know people tweet to be noticed. It’s a medium that is trying to be heard. I personally find it appalling that people could listen intently while, at the same time, writing. How can you be paying close attention? It’s not fair to the individual. They are providing an image of themselves, and evidence might be twisted to present the image of the tweeter with the notion of being unbiased.’

rcgranne@syr.edu

Published on December 7, 2010 at 12:00 pm