Court records

One of the most high-profile, domestic military prosecutions in decades will remain tightly sealed from public view.

An Army appeals court denied a request for public access to military court records in the court-martial of Pfc. Bradley Manning, who was arrested in May 2010 in Iraq for allegedly giving thousands of classified documents to the website WikiLeaks.

A Florida judge unsealed court records relating to the case of George Zimmerman - who is charged with the second-degree murder of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin - following legal requests by several news organizations.

In the first movement toward transparency in the tightly sealed trial of Pfc. Bradley Manning, the man accused of leaking thousands of classified documents to the website WikiLeaks, the court granted the defense permission to publish redacted versions of court filings online. But first, the government will have a chance to review, redact and bring up any concerns with the documents before they are released to the public.

Transcripts of pretrial hearings in the case of a Virginia man accused of molesting three girls at his daughter’s slumber party were made publicly available by a Virginia state court, reversing an emergency order to seal the records in February.

Judge William T. Newman, Jr. unsealed the records on March 22. He was unavailable for comment and it was not clear why he decided to make them public.

A bill that would have sealed some criminal records -- from minor offenses to felonies -- was vetoed by New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, who stated the public and media had a right to know about important information relating to criminal proceedings.

Court records in a Louisiana parish relating to sex crimes are now open to the public, after years of being under blanket seal.

Previously, no criminal court records involving allegations of sexual assault or abuse were available to the public, per oral order of the judges in the 27th judicial district, said Charles Jagneaux, St. Landry Parish Clerk of Court.

This secrecy was problematic for public safety and awareness reasons, Jagneaux said.

Video recordings of the contentious trial that struck down California’s ban on same-sex marriage will likely not be released to the public after all, following a federal appellate court’s reversal today of a lower court’s finding that there was no compelling reason for the tapes to remain sealed.

The maker of the iPhone and iPad failed to convince a federal judge in California that court documents in its lawsuit against a maker of Mac computer clones should remain shielded from public view.

Video recordings of the contentious trial that struck down California’s ban on same-sex marriage should be released to the public, a federal judge in San Francisco ordered Monday, ruling that there is no compelling reason that the tapes should remain sealed.