April 29, 2004

Reporters everywhere keep asking: Why is it taking so long to get the Kobe Bryant case to trial?

No apparent reason, aside from the fact that the case involves difficult, time-consuming and socially significant evidentiary issues having to do with victim privacy and the due process rights of the criminally accused.

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The accuser's attorney, John Clune, wants Eagle County District Judge Terry Ruckriegle to know how difficult the young woman's life has been, in arguing for an expedited trial date.

Clune deftly deflected the court's mildly pointed inquiries as to why Clune decided to file the motion publicly without raising the issue in court beforehand. He recounted the precipitating event for his unusual, "hurry-it-up" motion: A telephone call from his client, placed from a restaurant at a time when she feared that she was being stalked.

District Attorney Mark Hurlbert also expressed a desire for a quick trial setting, both to fend off the possibility of a post-conviction appeal on "denial of speedy trial" and to spare the young woman more months of uncertainty.

Nor did the defense want the case to drag on, Bryant attorney Hal Haddon asserted. He gently reminded the court that the defense had simply been following the custom in the 5th Judicial District that pre-trial motions be filed and determined prior to entry of plea and trial setting.

Noting that it was nice to have an issue on which everyone agreed, Judge Ruckriegle then ordered that the arraignment, the hearing when Bryant will officially plead not guilty and trigger the 180-day speedy trial law, will be held during the next round of scheduled motions hearings in the case, May 10-12.

Thus it brings to a merciful end one of the more puzzling periods in the case, in which the litigants took turns proclaiming their eagerness to bring the case to trial as soon as possible, figuratively beating their chests, professional wrestling-style, to show just how ready they were for the trial to start.

Bring it on! Let's litigate!

Posturing aside, the timing of the "speedy trial" motion filed on behalf of the alleged victim could not have been better from a public relations standpoint. After all, it came immediately after cross-examination of the young woman about the details of her love life. It announced to the world that she was determined to see the case through to the end, no matter what.

So why was no trial date set Wednesday, if everyone is so ready, willing and able to go to trial?

Because, as Judge Ruckriegle observed, the arraignment represents the first opportunity since Bryant's initial court appearances for the media to request in-court cameras. The law requires that notice be given for filing of "expanded media coverage" motions, a bit of a misnomer considering how "expanded" the coverage has already been.

Thus this final delay is to accommodate the impatient media itself, to allow for the possibility of a worldwide broadcast of one of the law's most dramatic non-events, entry of an inevitable not guilty plea in a celebrity criminal case. A fitting irony.

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

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