Eight years ago, in a fraud lawsuit filed by actress Sondra Locke against actor-director Clint Eastwood, the judge closed every hearing in which the jury wasn't hearing testimony.
An appellate court quickly reversed the judge. Later, the California Supreme Court upheld the appellate ruling in what is considered a landmark decision promoting openness in civil suits.
"It looks really good on the books," said Tom Newton, general counsel for the California Newspaper Publishers Assn. "But when the rubber hits the road, these [decisions] are often ignored or subordinated to other interests."
The Simpson case echoes through the access debate. The football legend was acquitted in the killings of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman. The trial was televised, and no gag orders were issued. A spectacle ensued, with attorneys playing to the cameras and seeking to spin the evidence in interviews.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Lance Ito was widely criticized for his stewardship of the trial. He sequestered the jurors, kept their names secret, initially closed some hearings in which panelists were questioned, and threatened to throw out the cameras. On the other hand, he cooperated with a multipart television profile of himself.
"Every judge is scared to death of becoming the next Lance Ito," Leslie said.
Ito declines to give interviews.
L.A. courts are less likely to admit cameras these days. Advocates of the 1st Amendment contend that cameras are the best means of public scrutiny in high-profile cases, the modern equivalent of an unlocked door to the village courthouse.
But in the Simpson case, the camera "exposed a judge not doing a good job managing his courtroom," said David Greene, executive director of the First Amendment Project. "Judges don't want that."
After Simpson, the California Judicial Council gave jurists more leeway to ban photography and television. Judges have barred cameras in the Jackson and Peterson cases. A decision is pending in the Bryant prosecution in Eagle County, Colo.
Federal courts historically have excluded cameras. As the Simpson case unfolded, the U.S. Judicial Conference abandoned a three-year pilot project to allow them.
"There is no instance in which a verdict has been altered because of the presence of cameras," said Barbara Cochran, president of the Radio-Television News Directors Assn., a booster of courtroom TV.
Earlier Cases
