Judge overstepped authority vis-a-vis press

June 30, 2004

District Judge Terry Ruckriegle has until Friday to explain to the state Supreme Court why the First Amendment doesn't apply in Eagle County. Somehow we think he's going to fail badly in the attempt.

What could Ruckriegle have been thinking last Thursday when he threatened to cite seven news outlets for contempt if they refused to destroy documents obtained through legal means rather than report on their contents? Doesn't he know that judges can't tell the media what they may publish, and that attempts to muzzle press freedom in this country almost invariably fail?

Advertisement

We're a little surprised the state high court didn't just lift Ruckriegle's order rather than keep it in place until the judge explains himself and the media get a chance to respond. After all, if the Nixon administration couldn't stop publication of the Pentagon Papers, which were stolen before being handed over to The New York Times, it's hard to see how Ruckriegle will prevail in suppressing the use of material whose release involved no crime whatsoever, but simply a mistake.

Naturally it is embarrassing for Ruckriegle that a court employee inadvertently e-mailed transcripts of closed hearings in the Kobe Bryant case to several news organizations, but that's not the recipients' fault. Once information migrates from a court to the private media, it is no longer under a judge's control. However much Ruckriegle might like news organizations to destroy the e-mails and never whisper a word to anyone about what they contained, the decision simply isn't his to make.

The U.S. Supreme Court has described prior restraint on publication as "the most serious and least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights," and no wonder. It amounts to government censorship, which is expressly forbidden in the Bill of Rights.

The Rocky Mountain News is not one of the media that received the unsolicited e-mails, but the legal brief filed on behalf of those that did certainly reflects our view. "The Constitution," it points out, "does not tolerate the executive or legislative branches commanding the press what it can report and when it can be reported; nor does the Constitution tolerate such control of the press by the judiciary, even when other important rights are at stake. Our system depends upon the judgment of an independent press . . . and it does not permit judges the option of regulating the content of news reports to achieve even legitimate judicial ends. Indeed, the presumption against enjoining publication of news information is so strong that the Supreme Court has never affirmed the imposition of such a prior restraint."

We're not sure why Ruckriegle thinks his imposition of prior restraint will break the pattern and be upheld by higher courts. It's not enough that he had valid reasons for closing the hearings, which dealt with the sex life of Bryant's accuser and the money she received under the state Crime Victims Compensation program. There are valid reasons for secrecy surrounding national security, too, and yet the Supreme Court also looks skeptically on prior restraint in cases in which national security is invoked.

If Ruckriegle is smart, he'll lift the order himself rather than waste everyone's time trying to defend a lost cause.

Copyright 2004, Rocky Mountain News. All Rights Reserved.