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Thursday, March 05, 2009

Law - Still more on unfinished or lost transcripts, and court transcripts in general

Updating this ILB entry from April 22, 2007, which looked at the problem of missing or unfinished court transcripts, here is one to add, from the Boston Globe.

"Missing trial tapes spawn an impasse: Stenographer denies she has them" is the headline to a story by Jonathan Saltzman. Some quotes:

When they do their jobs right, court stenographers attract little attention. They tap quietly on a shorthand machine at more than 200 words a minute to make a record of testimony or repeat verbatim everything said in court into a tape recorder. But among the cast of characters, they seldom play a starring role.

Jeanne Lentini, however, is getting a close-up, and not a flattering one. After working in the state courts under contract for eight years, she left Massachusetts in the spring of 2007 with tape recordings she made of 17 criminal and civil trials, court officials said. Despite demands to provide transcripts or return the tapes, which belong to the state, the officials said, she has sent back only seven recordings and some blank tapes.

Transcripts are the lifeblood of the appeal process, so the missing tapes have stymied litigants in 10 criminal and civil cases, preventing them from challenging the verdicts. * * *

Lentini, who lives in Virginia Beach, Va., said yesterday that she has returned all the tapes sought by the courts and is baffled and irritated by claims to the contrary.

"I thought this was taken care of," she said in a telephone interview. "I sent them all back. I did that last summer." * * *

The unusual dispute hardly marks the first time court reporters in Massachusetts have come under fire. In 2003, a committee of judges and lawyers appointed by the state Supreme Judicial Court issued a blistering report saying Massachusetts ranked among the worst states in providing timely, accurate transcripts.

The median time for a transcript to be delivered for appeals in criminal cases was 300 days and 141 days in civil cases. The committee headed by Appeals Court Judge Mark V. Green faulted "inadequate resources, systemic inefficiencies, and a lack of effective management."

But the allegations against Lentini are extraordinary, say court officials and lawyers involved, because she is thought to have deliberately ignored demands to provide transcripts or return the tapes so that another court reporter can prepare them.

In some instances, Lentini was one of several court reporters on a case; the other reporters have provided transcripts for the testimony they heard.

"These transcripts can't be produced without these tapes being returned," said Joan Kenney, a spokeswoman for the judiciary.

Long-time ILB readers may also recall the stories (and here) of the lengthy delay before completion of the transcript in the second David Camm murder trial. And there was the Fort Wayne case where the mother of a defendant took the court transcript and refused to return it.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on March 5, 2009 12:45 PM
Posted to General Law Related