By Denise Buffa
The New York Post
NEW YORK — A firefighter who survived the Black Sunday blaze that claimed the lives of two of his comrades testified yesterday that he didn’t realize a woman who was trying to reach him on Facebook during deliberations was a juror — until the guilty verdict came in.
Firefighter Brendan Cawley said a woman named Karen Krell tried to “friend” him on Facebook sometime between Feb. 12 and 17, but he pressed the “ignore” button because he didn’t recognize her name.
Cawley said he came to learn that Krell was a juror in the trial of the manager and corporate owner of the building where the 2005 fire raged — forcing him and five other firefighters to jump for their lives from a sixth-story window — only after the conviction was announced.
Defense attorneys are trying to get the verdict overturned, suggesting Krell was biased when she helped render it. She and 11 other jurors found building manager Cesar Rios and the corporate owner guilty of criminally negligent homicide.
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