Brian Malcom 

"While judges cannot isolate themselves entirely from the real world and cannot be expected to avoid all friendships outside of their judicial responsibilities, some restrictions upon a judge’s conduct are inherent in the office." Florida Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee, Opinion Number: 2009-20. 

Judges across America may notice their status in Web 2.0 slip a bit today.  The Florida Judicial Ethics and Advisory Committee ruled that it is inappropriate for judges to be social media "friends" with lawyers that could appear before them in court. The Committee based its decision on Canon 2(B) of the Florida Code of Judicial Conduct.  The Canon reads:  "A judge shall not lend the prestige of judicial office to advance the private interests of the judge or others; nor shall a judge convey or permit others to convey the impression that they are in a special position to influence the judge."     

The Committee determined "that listing lawyers who may appear before the judge as “friends” on a judge's social networking page reasonably conveys to others the impression that these lawyer “friends” are in a special position to influence the judge."  Accordingly, the Committee held that "that identifying lawyers who may appear before a judge as "friends" on a social networking site, if that relationship is disclosed to anyone other than the judge by virtue of the information being available for viewing on the internet, violates Canon 2(B)." 

In a bit of social media mercy, the Committee went on to clarify that judges can have "friends" on social media sites, but they cannot "friend" lawyers  who may appear before the judge.  Thus, the judge can friend non-lawyers and lawyers who do not appear before the judge, "either because they do not practice in the judge's area or court or because the judge has listed them on the judge’s recusal list so that their cases are not assigned to the judge." 

The Committee did clarify that its opinion applied to Facebook or "any social networking site which requires the member of the site to approve the listing of a “friend” or contact on the member's site, if (1) that person is a lawyer who appears before the judge, and (2) identification of the lawyer as the judge’s “friend” is thereafter displayed to the public or the judge's or lawyer's other “friends” on the judge's or the lawyer's page."  To name a few, this would encompass connections on LinkedIn, followers on Twitter, and friends on MySpace (do people still use MySpace?). 

Sorry, judges.