Sealed cases

The Colorado Supreme Court decided to unseal an indictment against a man suspected in the disappearance of his young daughter.

In an opinion issued April 7, the state’s highest court ordered the Arapahoe County District Court to unseal the indictment against Aaron Thompson. The decision came in a suit brought by The Denver Post and the Associated Press to unseal the record at the district court.

A bill aimed at preserving open court documents and proceedings has overcome a major hurdle in the Kansas Legislature after the House passed it almost unanimously on Friday.

After an entire civil case was closed to the public, the Charlotte Observer filed a motion in Union County Superior Court seeking access to the file, alleging its closure was improper. The court did not provide a reason for sealing the file; After requesting a copy of the records, the Observer was given "a single sheet of paper with a handwritten note saying the file had been sealed in its entirety," an Observer article stated.

A new court rule adopted by the Nevada Supreme Court places strict limits on a judge's ability to seal a civil case in the state, allowing the practice only if the "specified sealing or redaction is justified by identified compelling privacy or safety interests that outweight the public interest in access to the court record." While that leaves a great deal of wiggle room for a judge who wants to seal a case, it does at least establish a standard for sealing, and makes clear that the presumption

In a big win for access to the courts, the New Hampshire Supreme Court has ruled that court proceedings and records under the state's sexual predator statute are open to the public.  The Reporters Committee submitted a friend of the court brief in support of petitioners in the case, Newspapers of New Hampshire Inc., and the Union Leader Corporation. 

The Ninth Circuit earlier this week issued an opinion with what seemed like a pretty straightforward reading of the current state of access law: before a criminal proceeding can be closed to the public and the news media, a judge must find that there is a compelling interest to do so, and that the amount of closure is "narrowly tailored" to satisfy that interest.

It's one of those ironies that's probably going to keep coming up in this information age, where everyone is interested in the privacy of personal information but sharing more and more of it online.

In federal courts and on Capitol Hill, challenges are brewing to a key legal strategy President Bush is using to protect a secret surveillance program that monitors phone calls and e-mails inside the United States, The Associated Press reports. Under grilling from lawmakers and attack by lawsuits alleging Bush authorized the illegal wiretapping of Americans, the White House has invoked a legal defense known as the ''state secrets'' doctrine

According to the New Jersey Law Journal:

The settlement for the quadriplegic girl in the notorious Giants Stadium drunken-driving case must be kept secret so her estranged father won't learn how much money she has and try to steal it, a judge says in an opinion made public on Friday.

In a friend-of-the-court brief to the North Dakota Supreme Court, the Reporters Committee this week urged the court to issue a directive requiring lower courts in the state to follow specific procedures set forth in the law before sealing records.