Juror Brags ‘Always Wanted To F–k Up A Pedophile’ Online, Is Removed From Case

We can sympathize with a guy who confesses a desire to “f–k up a pedophile,” but that’s not the kind of thing you want to brag about online when you’re a juror in a sex offender case.

Kasim Davey was discharged as a juror in a London trial for doing just that.

After being selected to be a juror in a case regarding an alleged sex offender, Davey jumped on Facebook and wrote “Woooow I wasn’t expecting to be in a jury Deciding a paedophile’s fate, I’ve always wanted to f–k up a paedophile & now I’m within the law!”

Davey was discharged and will be prosecuted himself because the post puts him in breach of contempt of court laws. He denied posting the message when he was questioned by the judge on his case.

He was a juror in the trial of Adam Kephalas, a convicted child-sex offender who was handed a suspended 12-month prison sentence in January, reports The Guardian.

The attorney general called Davey’s Facebook post “an act likely to interfere with the due administration of justice.” Translation: You can’t impartially deliver justice as a juror when you’re carrying a personal grudge. Again, it’s an understandable grudge, but it does make the law “thing” kind of murky.

But the big lesson here has more to do with using discretion when you post things online. This contempt case is just the latest in a recent string of such prosecutions which involve jurors and other individuals talking about ongoing criminal trials on social media.

A related curiosity involves jurors researching cases online while they are in progress. The idea is to prevent prejudice on the part of the jury, and laws in the UK have been drafted to prosecute those who go hunting for such information.

Be careful what you post online, kids!

[Image via: Pan Xunbin / Shutterstock.com]