May 12, 2004

A plea at last.

Even without the usual supporting act of a trial date, Kobe Bryant's much-anticipated but inevitable plea of not guilty Tuesday sets the stage for this year's Trial of the Century.

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Not since O.J. Simpson gave arraignments a bad name by declaring himself to be "absolutely 100 percent not guilty" has so much largely unwarranted attention been focused on the entry of a not-guilty plea by yet one more celebrity facing criminal prosecution.

To practicing lawyers, the arraignment only matters when the client is pleading guilty to a charge, thereby potentially changing his or her life forever.

"Not guilty" pleas are so routine to criminal defense attorneys that frequently it is the lawyer and not the accused who announces the plea, almost as a footnote to the far more momentous significance of the setting of a trial date.

Which is what really heats things up in the typical case, as the arduous process of trial preparation then begins in earnest, usually with the ritual of sending out the witness subpoenas for the just-determined trial date.

Nowadays, media attention has transformed the biggest non-event in criminal law into a showy spectacle.

How and why did that happen?

For starters, even in jurisdictions generally receptive to public broadcasts of criminal proceedings, the rules prohibit electronic coverage of pretrial motions hearings, for good reason.

Such hearings often deal with testimony inadmissible at trial, making exclusion of cameras a sagacious precaution, particularly in high profile cases, where every possible nuance of publicly disclosed evidence is subjected to microscopic dissection and laborious analysis months before a single citizen receives a jury duty summons.

In 1949, Colorado was the first state to allow television coverage of criminal cases, but even our TV-friendly Colorado courts draw the line at the courthouse entrance when it comes to pretrial hearings.

Except, of course, for arraignments.

Then, for the first time in most criminal cases, the bars come down and in come the cameras and live electronic coverage begins.

Which goes a long ways toward explaining the peculiar preoccupation of the media with Kobe Bryant's public declaration of his innocence.

Or at least, his denial of legal guilt.

Of far more import to the outcome of this case and to the integrity of our justice system are the rulings that Eagle County Chief District Judge Terry Ruckriegle must make in the next few months on a plethora of legal issues, some matters of "first impression" for our courts, decisions that will determine the evidence at trial and public attitudes toward the validity of the proceedings.

Those rulings really matter and are well worth waiting for.

Even if, as is likely, there are no courtroom cameras there to capture the moment.

Scott Robinson is a Denver trial lawyer specializing in personal injury and criminal defense.

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