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Sunday, September 10, 2006

Courts - An end to secret dockets in Florida?

The St. Petersburg Times has an editorial today that begins:

When state Supreme Court Chief Justice Fred Lewis heard that court cases were being kept off the public docket in jurisdictions around Florida, his response was one of shock. "I almost swallowed my tongue," Lewis told the Miami Herald. But then shock turned to action as Lewis enlisted the state's clerks of court to suggest new statewide rules. The clerks have returned with a set of reasonable changes to current practices that would reduce the likelihood of court documents being put out of public reach.

The Florida Association of Court Clerks and Comptrollers draft proposal would sharply restrict the ability of judges to remove all evidence of a case's existence from the public docket. This has been a problem in the Broward Circuit Court in particular, where more than 400 divorce, negligence and other types of civil and criminal cases were wiped from the public record. A Herald investigation found that many of those cases involved politicians, judges and other highly visible or well-connected people.

Here is a list of some other ILB entries on secret dockets.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on September 10, 2006 01:00 PM
Posted to Indiana Courts