An Indianapolis Star editorial today, headlined "Court's wrong to seal evidence," opines:
Our position is: Once a document has been admitted into evidence in a trial, it should be an open record.See the entire editorial here. See the most recent Indiana Law Blog entry on this decision here, titled "More on release of divorce records." Posted by Marcia Oddi at June 21, 2004 01:25 PMThe Indiana Court of Appeals has locked the door long after the horse escaped from the stable in a case involving open court records.
A three-judge panel said courts could seal certain documents involving trade secrets and other exceptions to Indiana's open records law even after they've been admitted as evidence in open court. In this instance, the not-so-secret trade secrets were even splashed all over the pages of The New York Times for all to see.