Flynt v. Lombardi
The Reporters Committee, joined by 13 other media organization, filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit seeking information about a case brought by death row prisoners. The prisoners’ case at the district court level in Missouri focused on the lack of information available to the public about where the state gets its execution drugs. The court sealed several docket entries, one order, and many of the documents it relied upon to make decisions in the case. Publisher Larry Flynt moved to intervene in the case for the limited purpose of challenging those sealing orders; that motion was denied and he appealed. The Reporters Committee brief addressed the issue of standing to intervene for the purpose of unsealing court records, arguing that access is a public right and any denial is a “concrete harm.”