By David Montero, Rocky Mountain News
September 3, 2004

EAGLE - Nobody with a microphone, camera or notepad was asking the receptionist at the front desk much about Simon Sez Companies v. Al's Mobile Repair - slated for trial Thursday morning.

Nor did the media seem particularly interested in Nicole Everard's final hearing in the Eagle County Justice Center for a traffic infraction. No - Los Angeles Lakers basketball star Kobe Bryant was gone, his sexual-assault case dismissed Wednesday evening. With him went the media throng. And, as some locals added, the aggravation.

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"Things are back to normal," Patty Seifers said.

Seifers was behind the counter doing her normal job of handling unpaid traffic tickets, answering questions about small civil cases and filing routine paperwork. The only residue left from the Bryant affair was a few phone calls from those who were in the midst of being interviewed for jury selection in the now-defunct criminal case.

She said they wanted to know if they still needed to show up.

"They said they were watching the news accounts saying there would be no trial," Seifers said. "But they wanted to clear it with the judge first."

A few Thursday morning were willing to reflect on the past 14 months filled with Bryant's 6-6 frame striding through the tiny courthouse's hallway for motions or hearings argued by prosecutors and defense attorneys.

One of those was Karen Salas, the information coordinator for the state court administrator at the Colorado Judicial Branch.

Salas, who has been in the job for the past 21/2 years, was in charge of getting the court documents out to the public and said the experience of this case has soured her on the idea of putting information out on the Internet.

"The Web site was really a pilot for what potentially high-profile cases can look like in the future," she said. "I'm not sure now I'll be a proponent of putting things on the Web site."

Sitting on a bench inside the courthouse, Salas said the case has been "overwhelming" for her department, which has suffered under budget cutbacks. She said the recent budget reduced her staff to a level where she was doing the job of four people and her staff put in "14- to 16-hour days" during the case's course.

Bryant's case, she said, resulted in unprecedented hits on the state's Web site - averaging 15,000 per month. She said her staff scanned and posted nearly 900 documents online over the case's duration. But what bothers her, she said, is that out of those postings, her office will be remembered for a pair of critical mistakes.

The most recent one was when a court reporter accidentally sent transcripts of a closed-door rape shield hearing on June 24 to several news organizations. And back in September 2003, a document was posted on the state's Web site where the victim's name wasn't blacked out for about an hour.

"Those two mistakes are going to haunt us forever," Salas said.

Scrutiny from the media on those errors created "a siege mentality" in the office and gave her many sleepless nights, Salas said. She said a lot was learned in the wake of the Bryant experience, but for now, Salas said she's going to follow a judge's order issued to her Wednesday.

"He told us to take Friday off," she said.

By Thursday afternoon, Salas was already gone.

monterod@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5236

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