RALEIGH, N.C. — A week after three news organizations asked the North Carolina Court of Appeals to force Alamance County courts to let in journalists, the top local judges announced a new media access policy.
Reporters must request permission in advance to attend hearings, and up to five journalists will be allowed in, depending on the available space, D. Thomas Lambeth Jr., Judicial District 15A’s senior resident superior court judge, and Bradley Reid Allen Sr., the chief district court judge, said in an order dated Dec. 18.
In recent weeks, journalists who have sought to attend hearings related to the local Black Lives Matter movement have been kept out of Alamance courtrooms, even when they asked for permission in advance. Signs outside of the courthouse indicated that only victims and defendants would be allowed inside. Courthouse staff cited COVID-19 as the reason.
When the publisher of the Alamance News tried to formally object to journalists’ exclusion last week, submitting to Judge Fred Wilkins a document drafted by an attorney on behalf of his publication, The News & Observer and Triad City Beat, he was handcuffed and threatened with a contempt citation.
The publisher’s near-arrest made national headlines and prompted an outpouring of support from press freedom organizations such as the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
The U.S. and North Carolina constitutions give members of the public and the press the presumed right to attend criminal trials. In a landmark decision on the issue, the U.S. Supreme Court noted that secrecy breeds distrust while openness helps to combat misconduct. Journalists often stands in as a proxy for the public, bringing information about what happened in the courts to an audience far beyond those who were able to be in the courtroom.
Distrust in the criminal justice system is central to the cases reporters wanted to observe in Alamance County, which relate to the protests against white supremacy, police violence and structural racism that have roiled Graham, the county seat, for months. Demonstrations have often be held right outside the the county’s courthouses.
The new media access policy received a mixed review from one local legal expert.
Brooks Fuller, director of the North Carolina Open Government Coalition, said, “It’s a step in the right direction, but it leaves a few questions unanswered.”
Among the unanswered questions: What happens when a courtroom is full with people involved in the trial?
The judges’ order says, “In specific cases including, but not limited to those of an enhanced public interest and because of limited seating availability, audio and or video live streaming may be possible to persons outside the Courtroom and made available to the public and the press to be determined by the presiding Judge.”
“I would have liked to see more guidance in the order,” said Fuller, noting that courts across the country have been pioneering technological solutions to the court-access problem posed by COVID-19. “I think the risks are still there that discretion could be abused.”
Although journalists and the public were excluded from criminal court hearings at least twice in the past month, with no remote viewing option offered, the judges asserted in the new order that “Alamance County courts have remained open to the public and the media.”
They presented the new procedures as a clarification.
In the order’s final sentence, the judges offered a warning: “All persons are subject to the Contempt powers of the Court for violation of this Administrative Order.”
The petition submitted to the Court of Appeals by the Alamance News, The News & Observer and Triad City Beat remains pending.
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