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Judge Reprimands Temp Prosecutor for Blog Posts

A California attorney with the firm of Keker & Van Nest, while participating in a job swap with the San Francisco DA's office, was reprimanded by the judge overseeing a misdemeanor case he was prosecuting.  The judge found out about comments made in the attorney's personal blog!

"[The judge] didn't find the postings prejudicial enough to throw out the entire case, as the defense wanted. But in turning down that motion to dismiss this week, the judge still came down hard on ex-prosecutor Jay Kuo, calling his conduct "juvenile, obnoxious and unprofessional." Karnow also stated his intention to send his written ruling to the State Bar.

The contents of the blog posts were not available online Wednesday, but according to Karnow's ruling, Kuo at various points called his opposing counsel "chicken" when she asked for a continuance, directly alluded to her with some posting titles obscene enough that the judge did not repeat them and mentioned a prior conviction that had not yet been deemed admissible at trial."

It was not only the judge who didn't appreciate the attorney's blog entries.  "Kuo, who declined to comment on the ruling itself, did say he resigned from the temporary position after his posts on the Web site livejournal.com had made their way around the DA's office. "It was just not a comfortable environment to be in any more," he said."

Remember: You never know who is reading your blog out there, so be smart about what you post.

Excerpt taken from http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1146139204085 on Law.com

Posted by Marin Dell