TV Editorial Worries about Courtroom Closure

OPEN COURTS -- KSBW TV (Salinas) President and General Manager Joseph Heston editorializes about a judge's decision to close the courtroom for a preliminary hearing in a murder case, especially in light of the current celebration of Sunshine week.

In that “light” we can’t help but call attention to a Santa Cruz County judge’s decision on Wednesday in a Watsonville criminal trial. It’s the case of Veva Virgil; she’s accused of killing her three-year-old child, and during Wednesday’s preliminary hearing -- that’s the hearing where the judge decides if there’s enough evidence to proceed to trial -- the judge closed the courtroom! Nobody except the defendant, her attorney, and the prosecutor were allowed in the court to witness the hearings.
    Now to be clear: this isn’t a simple matter of the judge prohibiting cameras from the court. As broadcasters, we are repeatedly mystified by the provincial mindset of judges who think cameras have no place in a courtroom. But that’s another editorial for another day. In this case, Judge John Salazar has said NOBODY is allowed to witness these hearings. And that should be of grave concern to anybody and everybody who cares about how our government operates.

The closure of preliminary hearings has become a lot more rare than the heyday of such practices in the late 70s and early 80s, mostly because of a U.S. Supreme Court decision stemming from the closure of such a hearing in Riverside.  In Press-Enterprise v. Superior Court, then Chief Justice Burger wrote for the court:

Since a qualified First Amendment right of access attaches to preliminary hearings in California . . .  the proceedings cannot be closed unless specific, on-the-record findings are made demonstrating that "closure is essential to preserve higher values, and is narrowly tailored to serve that interest." . . . If the interest asserted is the right of the accused to a fair trial, the preliminary hearing shall be closed only if specific findings are made demonstrating that, first, there is a substantial probability that the defendant's right to a fair trial will be prejudiced by publicity that closure would prevent and, second, reasonable alternatives to closure cannot adequately protect the defendant's fair trial rights.

478 U.S. 1, 13 (1986).  Three facts are striking in the sole print news report about this closure.  The first is that no reference is made to any findings by the Watsonville court, as required by the First Amendment.  The second is that although the order banished no fewer than five news organizations from the courtroom, none appears to have summoned a lawyer—a response that would have been certain a generation ago.  The third is that the closest newspaper even to report the banishment was in San Jose, 47 highway miles away. Do we see where the collapse of the daily press is leading?

Comments

[someone]

Actually Jennifer Squires, the journalist who wrote that article, is from the Santa Cruz Sentinel and that article was published in the Sentinel before it was published in The Mercury.

So no, San Jose was not the first and only newspaper to report on this case.

This is why the courtroom was closed - people continuously are failing to get the facts straight, even when they're laid out right in front of you.