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Wednesday, May 05, 2010

Courts - "Judge closes trial's Internet window: In a medical negligence case, the court clerk was told to block online access to public documents"

Deciding that admonishing jurors not to access the internet was not enough, a judge in Oklahoma has twice blocked public access to the county court docket (ILB - similar to Indiana's Odyssey system) on cases in her court. Bill Braun reported in the Tulsa World on May 3, 2010:

In a sign of the Internet times, a Tulsa judge recently ordered online access to information about a specific civil case, via a court website, to be "restricted entirely for the duration of the trial in this matter," records show.

Lawyers involved in the trial "agreed to an order that would remove the docket sheet from the public access during the pendency of the trial," Tulsa County District Judge Linda Morrissey said.

During that trial, attempts to call up the history of developments in the case on a court website that has Tulsa County cases — tulsaworld.com/oscn — resulted in a screen empty of information except for a case number and a declaration of "no record." * * *

Accessing the case's docket sheet by computer, a day after the trial ended, showed that information was restored and there were 20 print-out pages, listing the parties, the lawyers and a chronological history of motions, orders and rulings.

An order signed by Morrissey says all parties in the case agreed with a directive that required Tulsa County Court Clerk Sally Howe Smith to take "all measures necessary" to comply with this restriction of access.

Lawyers were concerned that jurors could
be influenced by getting information, from a record of events in a case filed in February 2007, that could or would be inadmissible as trial evidence.

Morrissey said litigants have a right to a fair trial before an impartial jury, and she routinely gives strong admonitions to jurors that they not search the Internet for information about a case being tried.

In the recent medical case, there was sufficient concern among lawyers that "they did not want that possibility to exist," Morrissey said. * * *

Joey Senat, an associate professor of journalism at Oklahoma State University, said this court order "is essentially closing off court records from the public."

"If she is going to close off court records, she should have a compelling reason to justify it," said Senat, a former president of Freedom of Information Oklahoma Inc., a watchdog group supporting openness in government.

The lawyers involved in the trial "don't represent the public's interest in those records," Senat said.

A judicial admonition for jurors not to research via the Internet or other methods should be sufficient, he said.

What might be convenient to trial participants does not outweigh "the public's right or need to know,'' Senat said.

Morrissey issued a similar order restricting public access to docket sheet entries in a condemnation case that was tried in March.

Smith, the court clerk, said she thinks this type of request will become more common in Tulsa County, and "I am surprised it has not come up in a criminal case."

Posted by Marcia Oddi on May 5, 2010 09:23 AM
Posted to Courts in general