IL · jury_instructions
Ill. Pattern Jury Instr. (Criminal) 29.01A
Preliminary Cautionary Instructions Before Opening Statements
[1] Members of the jury, the trial is about to commence, and I now will instruct you as to
the law regarding some of your duties during trial and deliberations.
[2] You should not do any independent investigation or research on any subject or person
relating to the case. What you may have seen or heard outside the courtroom is not evidence. This
includes any press, radio, or television programs and it also includes any information available on
the Internet. Such programs, reports, and information are not evidence and your verdict must not be
influenced in any way by such material.
[3] For example, you must not use the Internet, including [(Google) (Wikipedia) (insert
current examples)], or any other sources that you might otherwise use, to search for any
information about the case, or the law which applies to the case, or the people involved in the case,
including the defendant, witnesses, lawyers, and judge.
[4] During the course of the trial, do not communicate with, provide information personally,
in writing, or electronically to anyone about this case — not even your own families or friends,
courtroom personnel, and also not even among yourselves until instructed otherwise.
[5] You must not provide any information about the case to anyone by any means at all, and
this includes posting information about the case, or your thoughts about it, on any device or Internet
site, including [(blogs) (chat rooms) or (insert current examples)], or any social networking
websites, such as [(Twitter) (Facebook) or (insert current examples)], or any other means.
[6] You cannot use any electronic devices or services to communicate about this case,
including [(cellphones) (smartphones) (laptops) (the Internet) (insert current examples)] and any
other tools of technology. The use of any such devices or services in connection with your duties is
prohibited.
[7] Lawyers, parties, and witnesses are not permitted to speak with you about any subject,
even if unrelated to this case, until after the case is over and you are discharged from your duties as
jurors.
Provenance
- Source
- illinoiscourts.gov
- Retrieved
- 2026-08-20
- Edition
- 2026-08-19
- Content hash
2f0d9cc4c42ada725be5aa09b58290f9e8e664678b668cdb270483e9c544e30f
The link goes to the issuing authority’s own document — the one we read to produce this record. Where a source publishes whole titles rather than sections, your browser may need a moment to jump to the provision.
Unofficial copy of government-published law, reproduced from official sources with full provenance. Not an official publication; verify against official sources before relying on it in a filing. Records in the 'guidance' corpus, and only that corpus, are sub-regulatory (interpretive guidelines, survey procedures) and are not binding law. Validity bounds follow each jurisdiction's declared temporalBasis.