« Ind. Decisions - "Judge gives reprieve to Hoosier Energy" | Main | Ind. Courts - Still more on: God and prayer continue in Indiana headlines »

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Courts - RI paper asks high court to make juror questionaires public

An interesting story from the Providence Rhode Island Journal, reported by Mike Stanton. Some quotes from the lengthy story:

Two years after 421 prospective jurors filled out questionnaires eliciting their opinions about the tragic Station nightclub fire that claimed 100 lives, The Providence Journal’s fight to open those records is bound for the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

In a case with implications for the openness of the jury-selection process, the newspaper has challenged a lower-court ruling denying access to the 32-page questionnaires, which were filled out in anticipation of the trial of former Station owner Michael A. Derderian. The case never went to trial, as Derderian and his brother Jeffrey Derderian entered into plea agreements, but lawyers for The Journal argue that the issue remains relevant to determining what kind of access the public and the press can expect in future cases.

The Supreme Court has scheduled oral arguments for Dec. 8.

In recent years, judges have used written questionnaires to weed out biases of potential jurors and streamline the selection process in high-profile corruption cases here in Rhode Island and nationally.

But while oral questioning of potential jurors is open, the written questionnaires have not been released. Even though they carried the disclaimer that the answers were not confidential, and “may be included in the public record,” Superior Court Judge Francis P. Darigan denied The Journal’s request to see them. Although the press and the public have “the presumptive right” to see jury questionnaires, Darigan cited “uniquely compelling situations” in sealing them in the Station fire case.

The ILB has reported on the juror questionaire issue before, in this entry from March 28, 2006, headed "Courts - Juror problems in federal trial of former Illinois Governor Ryan; thoughts on Indiana jurors," and in this entry from April 7, 2004, headed "Indiana Law - More on Juror Secrecy." Both ILB entries quote from a 2004 Fort Wayne Journal Gazette editorial, which included this:
Why should anyone care about this issue? The new jury privacy decree affects journalists, historians, advocates, researchers and anyone else who may want to ask jurors how a decision was reached. It is conceivable that jury tampering or a previously unknown connection between a juror and key player may not be revealed until an outside investigator lifts the veil. Undoing private deceit brings about reform and keeps down public cynicism and apathy.
[More at 11:10 AM] A reader writes:
Interesting issue on juror questionnaires. Had a friend on a jury a couple months ago, a trial on "precursor to meth" and "conspiracy to manufacture" charges. She called me after the trial to see if the questionnaires were made available to the defendant, since he had scared several of the jurors by the way he looked at them during the trial. I assured her that he might have looked over the info to help in choosing jurors, but would not have "access" to them. I confirmed with the attorney for the def. that this was accurate before telling her.

I think the rights of jurors have to be weighed in with the other rights you and other reporters/editors list. Home addresses, work addresses and questions about family members who are police might be of too much interest to a disappointed criminal defendant.
Good point. Here is more from the RI story:
It is important for the Supreme Court to set guidelines, said Journal lawyer Kristin E. Rodgers, citing a case that followed Darigan’s ruling, in which Superior Court Judge Edward C. Clifton destroyed questionnaires used to select a jury in the sexual-assault trial of a longtime East Providence councilman.

Furthermore, lawyers for the newspaper argue in court papers that Darigan and the attorney general “wholly ignore” the explicit instructions on the front of the questionnaire to mark sensitive questions as “personal” and circle them. The newspaper is not seeking unfettered access, but asking that the judge balance the privacy interests of certain information that might be too personal against the public interest of other information contained in the questionnaires.

Lynch counters that it’s not practical to redact all of the personal information scattered throughout the questionnaires, even to innocuous questions regarding family, friends and neighbors.

The Journal counters that Darigan, by withholding the questionnaires, “`has unnecessarily closed the criminal justice system from public view, thereby frustrating the broad public interest in knowing that laws are being enforced and the courts and the criminal justice system are functioning.”

Here are the Indiana juror rules, see particularly Rule #10.

Here are 123 questions from a 24-page California juror questionnaire in 2002. (I had no idea why is is on an Indiana TV station's webpage.) Here is a general juror questionnaire from Washington County Superior Court in Salem, IN.

Here is the Indiana Judicial Center's "Jury Rules FAQ," including specifically Rule 10.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on November 26, 2008 10:23 AM
Posted to Courts in general