Closed court records

A federal judge in New York decided Tuesday not to release the grand jury testimony of a crucial witness in Ethel Rosenberg's 1950s espionage case, although other related witness transcripts will be made public, The New York Times reported.

A North Dakota district judge wrongly refused to release the names of jurors after they convicted a man of murder last year, the state Supreme Court has ruled.

Finding Judge John Paulson's rationale -- that he'd promised not to identify the jurors -- "insufficient to overcome the presumption of public access," the high court unanimously ordered the judge to alert the jurors and then release their names.

A federal appeals court has rejected The Legal Intelligencer 's bid to access the sealed docket and files in a precedent-setting abortion case, in which a woman claims she was wrongfully fired for ending her pregnancy.

Federal appellate judges in Chicago heard oral arguments Tuesday over whether records containing police misconduct and excessive force complaints should be released to the public.

A freelance journalist and 28 city aldermen want access to documents that name the 662 Chicago police officers with more than 10 complaints filed against them. U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow ordered the release of the sealed misconduct accusations last July, but the city appealed.

Justices on the New Jersey Supreme Court heard testimony last week regarding a proposal to expand access to judicial documents. If implemented, the new rule would allow Internet publication of most records now available only at the courthouse.

The Iowa Attorney General’s Office asked the Iowa Workforce Department (IWD) last week to release the names of caregivers fired for abuse in nursing homes throughout the state.

Last August, some of the judges who preside over public hearings on unemployment benefit issues relied on a controversial interpretation of a 17-year-old law to seal the names of abusers, as well as other parties involved nursing home abuse incidents.

Editor's note (5/22): The New Jersey Senate Bill regarding confidential settlement agreements was not inspired solely by the parole board case. Sen. Nia H. Gill proposed the bill to correct the larger problem of secret settlements within New Jersey state government.

The New Jersey Senate is expected to vote on a measure Thursday that would ensure that “public entities” in the state could not enter into confidential agreements to settle claims to which the entity or the entity’s employee is a party.

For the seemingly dozenth time in the last few months, yet another move toward secrecy by embattled Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is making headlines. 

A committee formed by the Federal Judiciary to consider whether criminal plea agreements should be removed from public access on the Internet rejected the Department of Justice proposal that would have allowed for access only to the physical records at federal courthouses around the country.

In a time when many courts are working with advances in technology to provide public access to public court records online, Oklahoma has dealt a major blow to such progress with a new rule cutting off public access to court records currently available online.