Are there larger public policy issues such as possible police misconduct that are masked when proceedings are closed?
I would certainly hope that that’s not the purpose of being sealed. But what I would regard as a legitimate concern that a trial judge might have is, let’s just say there is a hearing to determine whether or not a search was properly conducted. And let’s just say arguably that it turns out that the search wasn’t properly conducted. But that it did disclose evidence that implicated somebody charged with an offense. And that’s something that judges have to contend with all of the time. If you have it discussed in an open hearing, it makes it virtually impossible to obtain a jury that will be able to decide the case on the merits. So this to me is a legitimate reason for closing that proceeding. But once the case is over, there is almost no justification for keeping something sealed. In the Westerfield case it took this newspaper going to the appellate court to get those records released after the trial was over. Judge Mudd acted only after being ordered to do so. One of the problems in t
Related Questions
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- Are there larger public policy issues such as possible police misconduct that are masked when proceedings are closed?
- Why is it important that information about police misconduct be made public?
