Social Media Influences High-ProFile Murder Case

The trial of Casey Anthony for the death of her daughter, Caylee, was dubbed the "social media trial of the century" by Time Magazine in 2011. During the trial, social media sites exploded with activity as people expressed their views about the trial on blogs, Facebook, and Twitter. The trial took place in the ninth Judicial Circuit Court located in Orlando, Florida. The Court used Twitter to keep more than 400 reporters up-to-date on the trial. in addition, there were Facebook pages honoring Caylee with tens of thousands of friends, and Twitter accounts that were adding followers at a rate of hundreds per day during the trial. A jury consultant for Casey Anthony's attorneys, Amy singer, analyzed more than 40,000 negative and positive highly charged opinions on social media sites and blogs and used them to help the defense form its trial strategy. Ms. singer and her team analyzed opinions about the defendant, evidence, and witness testimonies. she used these opinions to encourage the defense to change its strategy accordingly. For example, when the bloggers started to attack George Anthony for his extramarital affair, the defense team beefed up its questions against him. When the verdict was read, an online "lynch mob" escalated. At one point, a million people were blogging about the trial, not including the thousands more who were tweeting, texting, and discussing the case in online chat rooms. This trial illustrated how social media gets an insight into the public's mind and could revolutionize the way lawyers defend their clients. Discuss how social media may have influenced the outcome of the case and answer the following questions:

a. Did the activity on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn affect the proceedings? If so, how?

b. Did access to social media and the opinions of the public give a party an unfair advantage? If so, which party? How?

c. Should media broadcast of trials be banned to discourage social media access? Why or why not?

d. Shouldlegalproceedingsbeforbiddenterritoryforsocialmedia?Whyorwhynot?

e. Do you think the jurors had access to social media at the time of the trial? If so, could they have been influenced?

f. How does social media facilitate "up to the minute" coverage of the proceedings?