PETITION OF POST-NEWSWEEK STATIONS, FLORIDA, INC. FOR CHANGE IN CODE OF JUDICIAL CONDUCT
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The Court authorized an experimental program allowing televised coverage of one criminal and one civil trial under specific guidelines and judicial discretion.
[1] A court may authorize experimental television coverage of judicial proceedings as an exception to existing canons.
[2] Consent of parties, jurors, and witnesses is required for the televising of their participation in a trial.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligencePost-Newsweek Stations petitioned to modify Canon 3A(7) to allow televising judicial proceedings. After receiving opposition and materials, the Court …
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ROBERTS and SUNDBERG, Justices.
Post-Newsweek Stations, Florida, Inc. filed a petition for modification of Canon 3A(7) of the Code of Judicial Conduct of the State of Florida to the extent of allowing the televising of judicial proceedings and for the adoption of a rule in relation thereto proposed by the petitioner. In our Order, May 21, 1975, this Court denied that portion of the petition which seeks approval of the substitute of Canon 3A(7) proposed by the petitioner but granted the portion which seeks a reexamination of the Canon for the purpose of making the Court’s own revision, if such should be deemed appropriate.
The petition for change is opposed by (1) -The Florida Bar, (2) the Conference of Circuit Judges, (3) the Trial Lawyers Section of The Florida Bar, (4) Chairman of the Judicial Qualifications Commission expressing a personal view, and (5) others. Pursuant to the entry of our Order on May 21, 1975, the Court received various materials both pro and con in relation to the subject and observed a television video tape film prepared under the auspices of the Supreme Court of the State of Washington. Upon examination of all the foregoing, the Court determined that an on-site experimental program conducted under the auspices of this Court whereby one televised courtroom trial of a criminal case and one such trial of a civil case to be heard by the Circuit Court of the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida would be of assistance to this Court in the final disposition of the matter. To that end and for that purpose, this Court, by its Order of December 18, 1975, called for a conference of all counsel to convene at 10:30 A.M. on Thursday, January 15, 1976, in the Supreme Court Building to discuss the feasibility of such program. The Court’s Senior Justice, B. K. Roberts, was designated as its conferee with. directions to preside over the conference above referred to. Later, Justice Alan Sundberg was added as a co-conferee by the Chief Justice.
Upon inquiry from this Court, prior to the January 15, 1976, conference, Honorable Ben C. Willis, Chief Judge of the Circuit Court of the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida in and for Leon County, Florida, agreed to make a courtroom available for the two experimental trials and to personally conduct them.
The conference of counsel met on January 15, 1976, as directed, supra, and heard two hours of discussion by all interested parties. The conferees have made their report to the Court.
Now, therefore, as an exception to Canon 3A(7) of the Judicial Code of Florida for experimental purposes, Honorable Ben C. Willis, Chief Judge of the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida, he having accepted the assignment, is authorized to proceed with the trial of one criminal case and one civil case allowing television coverage, subject to the hereinafter mentioned guidelines, but with the Court vesting a wide discretion in the learned trial judge in the regulation of the television coverage and operation and the providing of such additional guidelines as he, in his discretion, may deem appropriate. The authority herein granted is subject to the following specific guidelines:
1. The parties to the litigation, jurors and witnesses must consent to the televising of their participation in the trial.
2. The television equipment in the criminal case shall be fully screened from view but in the civil case, with the consent of the parties, the television equipment may be in the open.
3. The trial judge shall have full authority to terminate the televising of all or any part of the proceedings which he deems would be an effective interference in the administration of the justice of the cause.
4. At the conclusion of each trial, the television film or tape shall be delivered to the trial judge for transmittal by him to this Court for filing as an exhibit in these proceedings. Neither the television film nor any copy thereof shall be used in any public newscast without prior permission of this Court.
5. The Supreme Court, either by a committee of its Justices or other monitors, from an unobtrusive location in the courtroom, will observe the proceedings and at the conclusion of each trial, the Court, through its designee or designees, will interview such of the participants as it deems appropriate, for their individual reactions in order to assist in determining the total effect of television coverage upon the conduct of the trials.
6. At the conclusion of the trials, request is made that the trial judge provide the Court with his analysis of the experiment.
It is so ordered.
ADKINS, C. J., and BOYD, OVER-TON, ENGLAND and HATCHETT, JJ., concur.
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Chandler v. State, 366 So. 2d 64 (Fla. 3d DCA 1978)…that a one year trial program should be instituted, the Florida Supreme Court has determined that camera coverage of a trial does not, in and of itself, violate the federal and state constitutions. Petition of Post-Newsweek Stations, Florida, Inc., 327 So. 2d 1 (Fla.1976), 337 So. 2d 804 (Fla.1976), 347 So. 2d 402 (Fla.1977), 347 So. 2d 404 (Fla.1977). We, therefore, decline to discuss further the constitutionality per se of the canon, although we will, in view of the importance of the question involved, c…
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Petition of Post-Newsweek Stations, 337 So. 2d 804 (Fla. 1976)…difficulty obtaining agreement of parties and counsel to provide a civil and criminal trial for televising in accordance with the guidelines set forth in our interlocutory decision reported in In re Petition of Post-Newsweek Stations, Florida, Inc., 327 So. 2d 1 (Fla.1976), as supplemented by our order dated April 12, 1976. We hereby amend our previous decision in this cause in order to authorize The Honorable Parker Lee McDonald, Circuit Judge of the Ninth Judicial Circuit, to conduct for experimental pur…1 / 2
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In re Petition OF Post-Newsweek Stations, 347 So. 2d 402 (Fla. 1977)…SUNDBERG, Justice. By interlocutory opinion filed in this cause on January 28, 1976, reported at 327 So. 2d 1 (Fla.1976), which decision has been several times supplemented to provide, inter alia, for inclusion of still camera photography, this Court has sought to have conducted for experimental purposes one televised civil and one televised criminal trial.…
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