Kaplan issued the admonition after a Manhattan jury ruled that former President Donald Trump was liable for defamation and sexual abuse and awarded Carroll $5 million.
“My advice to you is not to identify yourselves. Not now and not for a long time,” Kaplan said.
“If you’re one who elects to speak to others and to identify yourselves to others, I direct you not to identify anyone else who sat on this jury.
“Each of you owes that to the other whatever you decided for yourself.”
Kayyem tweeted: “This is some post-verdict jury instruction: you could get killed or injured, certainly harassed, definitely trolled so don’t identify yourself and don’t identify anybody else. T
“Trump’s strongest legacy will always be violence as an extension of our democratic processes.”
This was prudent on Judge Kaplan’s part. A lot of Trump’s followers are violent lunatics. We learned that on January 6, 2021. I certainly hope E. Jean Carroll is taking the proper precautions to keep herself safe.
I think it’s a given we’ll start learning names of jurors and probably fairly soon, even if the respective jurors themselves have enough common sense to heed the judge’s warning. Why? Well for starters we live in the age of celebrity worship AND various publishers (this is NYC after all) are probably driving vans through the streets advertising multi-million dollar advances for book deals. However, it goes beyond wanting fame and fortune.
People besides the jurors themselves know who they are. Spouses/Partners. Family. Employers (who even if they weren’t directly told will put two-and-two together). That’s just for starters. Add in lawyers (looking at YOU Team Trump) and their underlings that came into the courtroom, members of the public who attended the trial, and of course journalists who simply won’t be able to resist doing their own digging. Does anyone for a second believe all these people refrained from sneaking pics of the jury box? Then we have folks who camped out monitoring parking near the courthouse, the hallways too looking for folks they thought were jurors. And finally we have courthouse staff, some of whom have already been offered large sums by GOP operatives to provide info. on the jurors.
There’s a line from those who are in national security that the odds of a secret being revealed is the SQUARE of the number of people who know it. Add up all of the people I’ve listed (not a complete list either) and you get the idea. Some people just HAVE to prove to others how “special” they are by sharing something like this in those “swear you won’t tell anybody but…” chats with a trusted friend.
Not to mention I believe before the week is out the MSM will band together in a lawsuit demanding that since trials are public proceedings that the first amendment gives them the right to know exactly who passed judgement on Trump!
Trump wants to know who these people are so he can sic the MAGAs on them. So do his most rabid supporters that have money to spend to get the information. Unless/until the justice system sends people to prison for reckless endangerment and/or witness intimidation in this or other cases with this kind of noteriety people will talk.