July 1 - The night before a federal jury in Camden, New Jersey, began deliberations in the U.S. government’s case accusing Kevin Ruiz-Quezada of assaulting an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer, a juror named Stephen Meile had questions.

During trial, jurors had been shown a photograph depicting a patch on an ICE officer’s uniform. There was a suggestion that the patch was a trade union logo. Meile, a retired pipefitter, didn’t think it was.

So he looked it up on Google and told fellow jurors what he found out. (More on that later.)

And now he’s facing a fine of $11,227 after being held in criminal contempt for defying court orders and causing a mistrial in Ruiz-Quezada’s case.

In the underlying criminal case Meile was empaneled to decide, the New Jersey U.S. Attorney’s office alleged that Ruiz-Quezada resisted arrest when ICE officers came to his home in December 2017 to execute an administrative arrest warrant and initiate immigration proceedings. Ruiz-Quezada, a lawful permanent resident, contended that he was not resisting arrest but merely reaching for a coat because it was early in the morning and he was dressed in pajamas. One ICE officer experienced a hand injury in the scuffle inside Ruiz-Quezada’s house. He was indicted for assaulting a federal officer.

The jury’s deliberations came to an abrupt end that afternoon, when Juror 7 informed a court official that another juror had disobeyed the judge’s instructions and conducted online research. The first juror didn’t know Meile’s name. But in sworn testimony, according to a transcript of the late-afternoon hearing, Juror 7 told Kugler that Meile had looked up the logo on the ICE officer’s uniform the night before deliberations began.

When the jury took the case, Juror 7 said, Meile asserted that his research showed the ICE officer's patch was a white supremacist logo.

“He said that to the whole jury?” Kugler asked. “What was the reaction of the other jurors?”

Juror 7 said jurors weren't influenced by Meile's white supremacist assertion because no one knew if it was true. But they were all distressed about Meile’s violation of court orders, the juror told Kugler.

“Everybody was very upset that he just didn't listen and did the research," Juror 7 said. (I asked the New Jersey U.S. Attorney’s office and defense counsel Justin Loughry for additional information about the ICE officer’s patch and its role at the trial. A spokesperson for prosecutors declined to comment and Loughry didn’t respond.)

After Juror 7’s testimony, prosecutors and defense lawyers agreed that Kugler should declare a mistrial because Meile's disclosure of his search results had tainted the jury.