BY DAN VALENTI

There’s dumb. There’s dumber. There’s dumbest. And there’s Seth Rogovoy.

The Court: As close as we can get to sacred in civil life.

Yesterday, The Planet got wind of Rogovoy’s twittering from the jury box. [EDITOR’S NOTE: Conor Berry of the Berkshire Eagle, who covered the trial, disputes that Rogovoy was twittering from the jury box itself, as in literally. The Planet agrees and never contended that. Our use of the phrase “twittering from the jury box” is explained in our “Comments” note below, responding to Berry’s posting there.] Anybody with a Twitter account could read the Fedora Man’s comments about being a jurist. One of our readers sent us the dope (the info, not Rogovoy). We decided PCBs were more important than the editor of the only magazine in history printed on pages of fake foi gras. Cheez Whiz for the upper crust. We refer, of course, to the ever-thinner, vomit inducing  Berkshire Living magazine. We therefore let it be.

Today, the Boring Broadsheet, late as always (the story was reported earlier in Springfield and Hartford) included details of the Rogo Boy’s dumb move from the jury box. What, didn’t Rogovoy watch episodes of “Perry Mason” as a kid? We did. We know that you don’t mess around in court. That’s sacred civil ground.

Superior Court Judge John Agostini gave Rogs a right-quick lesson in jurisprudence. Agostini ruled, rightly, that when a twit Twitters about a trial while he’s a member of that trial’s jury, the twit deserves the boot. Agostini ruled Rogovoy’s vapid messages violated the judge’s instructions, orders, that jurors could not discuss the case.

That idiot’s move stopped deliberations, putting a kink in the trial. Who knows, now, what effect that will have on everybody in that courtroom, particularly the other remaining jurors plus the one substitute who must now step in. Mess with a trial’s proceedings, and you are messing with the foundations of our republic.

The case wasn’t mickey mouse stuff. The case concerns charges of child abuse against a former priest. Two former altar voice are the plaintiffs. Rogocop told the Eagle his Twittering had “absolutely nothing to do with this particular trial in particular.” We shoot adjectives like “absolutely” and “particular” on sight. “Absolutely nothing”? “this particular trial”? Guilty.

One of this genius’ message on Twitter: “Sucks that you can’t tweet from the jury box. What’s the fun in that.”

Rogovoy, it may “suck,” and it may ruin your “fun,” but while you were sitting on that panel, you held a man’s life in your hands. It is good that you are bounced and cannot weigh in on the man’s fate, because you would be incapable of rendering an objective judgment. Your idiotic twittering proves that.

The Planet holds the courts in highest respect. Our judicial system has flaws, but at least this country conducts court proceedings in the open. Our entire democratic system rests in large part of this openness. It’s just that “open proceedings” can never include something as stupid as twittering.

We served on a jury, foreman in fact, on a case in January 2007. We listened to the testimony as best we could, followed the judge’s instructions, and took on the heavy responsibility of finding someone guilt or not guilty. We played it straight, soberly, and with the greatest respect. Serving on a jury is a task that allows NO monkey business.

BERKSHIRE LIVING: Fire your editor for making a mockery of the courts.

Rogovoy apparently takes his responsibility as a juror as another hoot, sort of like writing or commissioning the suck-up articles routinely posts in Foo Foo Living magazine. His bosses there must demand his immediate resignation for this embarrassment. Tell him to take his Fedora, his peteryarrow zither music, and his kiss-up celebrity worship and go back to writing obits. Friends, please send the owners of Berkshire Living this opinion, if you agree with The Planet. If you disagree, let US know.

Ye, The Planet realizes we just blew our chances of ever appearing in Foo Foo Living. Smart, ain’t it, in a method-to-our-madness way. For the day we are profiled there or have a byline there is the day when we shall return to our farm in Essex and keep bees for the rest of our lives.