The curtain-lowering trend has stung 1st Amendment advocates, who trace it to an anti-media backlash after the O.J. Simpson murder trial in 1995. They say that secrecy might have contributed to jury problems in high-profile trials, and that numerous appellate court decisions have reaffirmed openness in prosecutions not involving national security.
Those precedents hold that a watchful public is crucial to the competent and impartial administration of justice. But the precedents are being tested again and again in lower courts caught in the spotlight's glare -- high-interest cases like those involving Jackson, Martha Stewart, Kobe Bryant and the suddenly famous Scott Peterson, the Modesto fertilizer salesman charged with killing his wife, Laci, and the unborn son she was carrying.
"Despite the case law, it is becoming virtually routine to keep information from the public," said Terry Francke, general counsel for the California First Amendment Coalition.
He noted that a search warrant typically is available for anyone's inspection no later than 10 days after the search, along with a sworn affidavit from investigators and an inventory of any evidence collected.
The affidavit spells out what the authorities sought in the search and why. Disclosure is supposed to ensure that the government doesn't invade private domains willy-nilly or confiscate property without the court's permission.
That transparency has turned opaque in People vs. Jackson. Every warrant in the probe, going back to the November search of Jackson's Neverland ranch in Santa Barbara County, has been sealed or released only after heavy editing.
And the clock can run for years. Two key warrants from a 1993 investigation of Jackson on similar allegations apparently remain unrevealed to this day. The warrants are so old that the Los Angeles Superior Court, in clearing the yellowing clutter from its files, destroyed them.
Francke says he believes such tactics don't rile the public because of a sense that the media provide more than enough coverage of celebrity cases.
"People aren't starved for information about Michael Jackson's plight," he noted.
Search warrants also have been sealed in the rape case against Laker basketball player Bryant and the murder prosecution of Peterson.
Faith in Juries
