GRAHAM, N.C. — The publisher of the Alamance News was handcuffed in court Tuesday as he objected to a judge's decision to block reporters from attending a sentencing hearing in a case that has been the focus for local Black Lives Matter activists.
Tom Boney Jr. was delivering a document written by C. Amanda Martin, an attorney representing him, along with The News & Observer and Triad City Beat, requesting a hearing on whether it's appropriate to close the court to the media.
Reporters from The News & Observer and Triad City Beat had earlier been told that no journalists were allowed in Alamance County's Historic Courthouse, where Judge Fred Wilkins was presiding over the case against Sandrea W. Brazee, a 52-year-old woman accused of driving her car at two girls of color.
The reporters each asked for a hearing before the judge, but were told by deputies that Judge Fred Wilkins had already made his decision. Like Boney, they had also been kept from attending a high-profile court hearing the week before involving the leader of a march that ended with police pepper-spraying attendees.
Boney had hand-delivered a letter to Senior Resident Superior Court Judge D. Thomas Lambeth and Chief District Court Judge Bradley Reid Allen Jr. on Tuesday morning asking that they remind other judges that courtrooms must remain open to the public despite COVID-19 safety precautions.
"We believe there is a paramount responsibility to find ways to comply with the N.C. Constitution's requirement that "All courts shall be open" (Article 1, section 18), even with the attendant challenges associated with the pandemic," Boney wrote.
He enclosed pages from a handbook for judges published by UNC's School of Government that explained that closing a courtroom entirely is an extraordinary step requiring procedural safeguards in advance.
In court on Tuesday, Wilkins said he would hold Boney in contempt of court after Boney tried to explain his objection.
Wilkins later relented and did not follow through, Boney said, but Boney was nonetheless ordered out of the courthouse and walked back to his nearby office by a sheriff's deputy.
"They were really quite rough in handcuffing me and claiming that I'm resisting," Boney said describing his removal. "I wouldn't have been surprised if they had broken my wrist."
