The courtroom camera in San Juan County, Washington “zoomed back out and then panned to the left to the defense counsel’s table and zoomed down directly on [her] yellow legal pad….” So why’d it do that? The sheriff appears to have argued that releasing the video in question “‘could expose weaknesses in court security,’ but it’s a little late for that. In any event, there is a more interesting question still to be answered, namely why the sheriff can control a courtroom camera from his office.” [Kevin Underhill, Lowering the Bar]
Posts Tagged ‘cameras in the courtroom’
Cameras at the Supreme Court
Unlike many writers and journalists I’m not a fan of cameras in the courtroom and in particular not the perennial proposal to introduce cameras at the Supreme Court. So it’s nice to run into a piece by someone who apparently agrees [Jonathan Bruno, SSRN]
Sometimes privacy wins out
A Utah lawyer has been stalled on his hopes of broadcasting divorce cases on YouTube [Salt Lake Tribune]
Against cameras at the Supreme Court
The rest of government, from Congress to the White House to prosecution to the regulatory agencies, is already rife with grandstanding. We don’t need or want it in the branch that’s supposed to be best insulated from popular passions. [Tamara Tabo, Above the Law] Earlier on cameras in the courtroom here.
March 5 roundup
- U.S. Commission on Civil Rights commissioners Gail Heriot, Peter Kirsanow: Administration’s new policy on race and school discipline likely to make schools more chaotic [Robby Soave, Daily Caller, 2011 related, earlier here, etc.]
- French court: fan club members suffered legally cognizable emotional damage from Michael Jackson’s death [Lowering the Bar, earlier]
- “The Newkirk incident demonstrates why cameras in the courtroom are a bad idea” [James Taranto, includes bonus New York Times disgrace]
- Claim: advocates stymied firearms research over most of past two decades. Accurate? [Fox News]
- Another look at the CPSC’s war on former Buckyballs CEO Craig Zucker [Jim Epstein, Reason, earlier]
- Chris Christie use of monitorships in white-collar prosecutions draws renewed scrutiny [New Republic, earlier]
- In which I am included in a list with George Will and Heather Mac Donald, all very flattering etc. etc. [Charles C. W. Cooke, NRO]
- D.C.: disbarred lawyer sat for years as workers comp judge [Washington City Paper]
- “German home-school family won’t be deported” although Supreme Court declines to hear asylum appeal [AP; discussion in comments earlier]
One way to get around courtroom camera ban
Ohio TV station WOIO is re-enacting highlights of a local corruption trial with puppets. More: Lowering the Bar (“I think that all court proceedings should be reported in this way, but would settle for either puppet coverage of arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court or a full reenactment of the Rod Blagojevich trial.”)