Courtroom romance gone wrong

Juror’s ‘ill-advised’ conduct led to conviction questions

Their romance began in a Manhattan courtroom: he was on the witness stand, she was in the jury box.

They locked eyes — it “helped calm my nerves,” said jailbird Xavier Classen, a self-described reformed bad boy. He liked what he saw.

“You know, she was one of the pretty ones,” Classen said.

And Juror No. 6 liked what she saw too — there was a spark, she said.

The unlikely pas de deux nearly derailed the conviction of East Army gang member Tysheem McGregor, who was charged with attempted murder in a June 2016 take down of street crews that followed the killing of a police officer in East Harlem. Classen was testifying against McGregor as a cooperating witness for the prosecution.

The juror’s conduct was “ill-advised,” said prosecutors in the Manhattan DA’s office. But Justice Robert Stolz ultimately agreed with them that the shenanigans didn’t warrant overturning McGregor’s conviction.

McGregor, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison, will appeal, his lawyer said.

No. 6, whose name is being withheld by The News, wrote her first note to Classen on June 26, 2017, as she and her fellow jurors deliberated McGregor’s case.

“She said she was one of the jurors and she said she was the blondheaded woman with the bun, which I instantly remembered,” Classen said at a hearing held last October.

No. 6 swore her initial flirtation with Classen did not affect her verdict. She also said she didn’t believe Classen’s testimony was key to the case.

Within days of that initial outreach, Juror 6 and Classen were pen pals and speaking on the phone.

Then, the jailhouse visits started.

Classen estimated that his new love sent him 50 letters by the time their affair was put before a judge.

Speaking to witnesses during a trial is a strict violation of a judge’s instructions. Standard jury instructions in New York say jurors must not “not converse, either among yourselves or with anyone else, about anything related to the case.”

Prosecutors argued in court papers that Juror No. 6 didn’t technically violate the rules, although she used bad judgement and her conduct was “ill-advised.”

But she just couldn’t wait to get in touch with her future beau.

“I wasn’t even thinking about any of that at the moment,” the juror said on the witness stand. “I was just being a human being making a mistake at that moment.”

She explained her rationale further.

“I just felt bad for someone who really did try to change their life and then their history caught up after them,” she said. “So I wanted to … kind of give him some hope not to give up…. And obviously there was a physical attraction that I had.”

After the verdict, the lovesick lady even penned a letter to Assistant District Attorney Meghan Hast to beg her for leniency on her new man’s behalf.

Hast was forced to disclose the shocking conflict to McGregor’s attorney, prompting a bid to get the verdict thrown out on the grounds that there was improper conduct.

McGregor was convicted of conspiracy, attempted murder, assault and weapons possession on July 5, 2017.

He was acquitted of another count of attempted murder, and separate counts of assault, attempted gang assault and weapons possession.

Classen and Juror 6 asked Stolz for permission to get married. But their plans to tie the knot fell through — and the couple broke up after several months, partly because of the drama of their unorthodox relationship.