I was under the impression that the U.S. system of justice was a matter of public record – that if someone committed a crime, was arrested, charged, tried, convicted, and sentenced, these events would be in the public record. Of course some trial proceedings have to be in camera, some testimony or evidence has to be redacted for legal or security reasons, but I thought that the existence of the judicial events was a matter of public record.
Wrong. As this story in the Smirking Chimp (reprinted from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel) shows, there have been trials unconnected with matters of public safety or national security in which:
Neither case appeared on the court’s public docket, where it would have been assigned a number and scanned into a computer file. As a result, the public had no way of knowing they existed. Hearings were conducted behind closed doors, and all documents and legal motions were filed under seal. The sensitive court papers were kept separately in a vault at the court clerk’s office in Miami, according to attorneys familiar with the practice.
I thought such things only happened in police states….