The juror dismissed from the Sarah Stern murder trial over a comment on Facebook said she is relieved to be away from the trial, which was causing vivid nightmares, but said she didn’t make the comment.

The juror was dismissed about 4:30 p.m. Thursday after Judge Richard English learned she wrote a Facebook comment about the case. “Sitting on the jury LMAO" (laughing my a-- off), read the comment on a news article about the trial, Assistant Monmouth County Prosecutor Meghan Doyle said in court Wednesday.

In an interview with NJ Advance Media over Facebook Messenger, the juror, who asked to be identified as a 21-year-old Middletown resident, also claimed the Facebook comment was made by her younger sister, with whom she shares an account — though the account only lists the juror’s name and her claim could not be independently verified. The juror said she deleted the comment as soon as she saw it.

She said the case, which has been going on for several weeks, was “taking a toll on me emotionally.”

“A lot of people kept telling me I looked like (Stern) and everyone involved was my age and so it was a lot to handle,” the juror said in a Facebook message. “I started having really vivid nightmares about it and I couldn’t take it anymore. It was too much.”

Last week, the jury watched a secretly recorded video of Liam McAtasney speaking to a cooperating witness in detail about how he strangled Stern, 19, and then watched her die. He also laid out how he studied Stern for months and plotted to make her death appear as if she had committed suicide.

“I can’t say much about the video other than it was extremely difficult to watch,” the dismissed juror said. “I can’t go into detail until the case is actually over but like I said, very hard to watch.”

McAtasney is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Stern. Authorities allege he killed her during a robbery at her Neptune City home on Dec. 2, 2016. He then enlisted the help of Preston Taylor, his roommate and Stern’s junior prom date, to help remove her body from the house and toss it over the Route 35 bridge in Belmar, authorities said. Stern’s body was never found.

Taylor has admitted his role in the case and testified against McAtasney on the first day of the trial. Taylor testified that the two thought they would get up to $100,000 from Stern but only made away with about $10,000.

The dismissed juror declined to answer a question about whether she believes McAtasney is guilty.

“I didn’t get to hear the defense’s arguments, so I would’ve been curious,” she said. “I can’t have a verdict without hearing the defense.”

The juror said she is relieved to back into a normal routine.

“I do wish I had tried harder not to take it so much to heart,” she said, “just so I could be a part of the case because it is such an intense and important case.”

The dismissal of the juror wasn’t made public until Wednesday, just prior to the state calling its final witnesses.

Before the start of the proceedings Wednesday, the jury was called into the courtroom and then asked one by one if they had knowledge of why the juror was dismissed. Five of the jurors said they learned the dismissed juror had posted something about the case on Facebook but that they had no knowledge of the contents of the post.

McAtasney’s attorney, Carlos Diaz-Cobo, asked English to take the rest of the day Wednesday to research the issue and write a brief seeking a mistrial. English granted the defense’s request.

Doyle and Christopher Decker, the other assistant prosecutor on the case, appeared visibly angered by the break.

English is scheduled to rule on Diaz-Cobo’s motion for a mistrial on Thursday.

Alex Napoliello may be reached at anapoliello@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @alexnapoNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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