Juror fined for contacting Sanjana during Anand Jon trial

A "disgraceful" juror in the Anand Jon Alexander rape trial has been fined $1,000 and sentenced to 120 hours of community service for trying to strike up a romance with Sanjana, the sister of India-born celebrity fashion designer who was given a 59 year jail term last month.

Alvin Dymally was fined $1,000 and ordered 120 hours of community service yesterday by judge David S Wesley for contempt of court but was not sent to jail.

"Your actions delayed the proceedings in this case for some eight months, cost the taxpayers of this county tens of thousands of dollars and, frankly, were disgraceful," Wesley told Dymally, Los Angeles Times reported.

The judge said the evidence was clear that the juror gave his telephone number to Sanjana before the verdict, and spoke to her on two occasions when she called him from a payphone. And that he had lied in court while denying the charges, the report said.

Dymally apologised saying he meant no disrespect to the court, "I am definitely, 150 per cent sorry."

Alexander's attorneys had seized on the juror's actions and asked the court to throw out the guilty verdicts for the designer.

Alexander was sentenced last month to 59 years of life imprisonment for 16 counts of rape of aspiring models, sexual assault and other crimes.