Johnson v. State

Although the court in this case attempted to instruct the jury that they should not show their notes to other jurors and that if other jurors attempted to show their notes, they should caution that juror that doing so was improper, I would nevertheless disallow the practice of jury note-taking altogether and the use of the notes by the note-taking juror during deliberations.

The majority points out that many jurisdictions allow note-taking by jurors; the majori*961ty fails to distinguish those jurisdictions which have recognized that prejudice arises when the juror notes are taken into the jury…