Title: State v. Schaefer

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under V.R.A.P. 40
as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont Reports.
Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Vermont Supreme
Court, 111 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05602 of any errors in order
that corrections may be made before this opinion goes to press.


                           Nos. 84-484 & 84-515


State of Vermont                             Supreme Court

                                             On Appeal from
     v.                                      District Court of Vermont,
                                             Unit No. 1, Windham Circuit

Gary Lee Schaefer                            March Term, 1990
Herald Association, et al, Intervenor


George F. Ellison, J.

Robert B. Hemley and Dennis R. Pearson of Gravel and Shea, Burlington,
  for intervenors-appellants

Walter M. Morris, Jr., Defender General, and Henry Hinton, Appellate
  Defender, Montpelier, for defendant-appellee


PRESENT:  Allen, C.J., Peck, Gibson, (FN1) Dooley and Morse, JJ.


     DOOLEY, J.   Intervenor-appellants appeal the district court's orders
sealing the affidavits of probable cause, closing partially a hearing on a
motion to suppress and further prohibiting all law enforcement officers and
all attorneys associated with defendant's case from making any public
statements about this criminal case.  Intervenors are the publishers of
daily newspapers in Vermont.  They argue that the orders violate the First
Amendment rights of the public to obtain information about the operation of
the courts.  We agree and reverse.
     Defendant Gary Schaefer was arraigned on the charge of second-degree
murder on May 10, 1984.  He pled not guilty, and upon the request of his
attorney, the court issued an order sealing the affidavit of probable cause
to preserve defendant's state and federal constitutional rights.  The
court's order also prohibited all law enforcement officers and all attorneys
associated with the case from making any statements "either at public
meetings or proceedings intended for public reporting or dissemination"
concerning the merits of the case, the evidence in the case, or any other
matters that were not of record in the court.
     On May 22, 1984, appellants filed a "Motion to Intervene" and a "Motion
for Relief from Order," seeking access to the affidavit of probable cause.
The trial court denied the motions without prejudice because appellants
lacked any legal status within the pending criminal prosecution and because
the motion to intervene was not supported by a memorandum of law as required
by V.R.Cr.P. 47(a).  Appellants then filed a motion for reconsideration, and
an evidentiary hearing was held on this motion.  The witnesses consisted of
editors of appellant newspapers.  Also admitted were newspaper stories about
another murder prosecution against defendant for which he was convicted in
December of 1983.  The court refused to admit surveys taken by reporters for
appellants based on random interviews of newspaper readers.  In the
interview, the reporter asked each person to answer the question: "Who is
Gary Schaefer?"
     Based on the evidence, the court made findings and denied the motion to
reconsider.  The court found that reporters for appellants had no famil-
iarity with the standards established by the American Bar Association which
prohibit the dissemination of pretrial criminal information if such release
would pose a clear and present danger to the fairness of the trial.  The
newspapers themselves have no standards or policy concerning what to print
from pretrial proceedings except that they will not print libelous news.
Essentially, the court found, the newspapers' "guidelines are to go out and
cover the story and whatever information is found becomes fair to report,"
including the prior criminal record of the accused, the content of a
defendant's confession or admissions and the content of a defendant's
testimony during a suppression hearing.  Furthermore, appellants have
published such information in the past and would not withhold such inform-
ation from publication if requested to do so.  The court specifically noted
that one of the newspapers had published defendant's confession in the prior
murder case "before trial of the case and even before the defendant was
charged" and all of the newspapers, and the local television station,
reported on the confession despite the pendency of a motion to suppress it.
The court further found that these newspapers have wide-spread circulation
and readership throughout Vermont, and, as a result, "[i]t is fair to say
such a case as this would be almost totally published throughout the entire
State."
     Based upon these findings, the trial court concluded that "Defendant
has demonstrated by clear necessity the need for the affidavit to remain
sealed and that no reasonable alternatives exist to protect his right to a
fair trial and an untainted jury pool." (FN2) The court relied on its finding
that appellants would print the content of the affidavits of probable cause
regardless of the effect of that publicity on defendant's right to a fair
trial and that there would be "wide spread, general publicity of the
contents of the Affidavits" right up to the date of the trial.  The court
rejected the alternatives concluding that a continuance was not possible,
that change of venue would be of "little practical benefit" in the face of
the statewide publicity and that no amount of voir dire would be effective
where a juror knew of a suppressed statement by defendant.
     As to the restrictive order, the court found that defendant had shown a
"clear necessity" for such an order in light of the publicity.  The court
upheld the restrictive order, concluding it justified by the same facts that
justified the sealing order.
     Following the ruling on the motion for reconsideration, the trial court
considered a motion to suppress statements made by defendant to the police.
Defendant sought closure of the hearing on the motion, and appellants
objected.  Based on its findings in connection with the sealing order, the
court ruled that closure was needed as to "questions and answers of an
interrogatory interview with the Defendant."  The court's ruling indicated
that the content of that interview was set forth in the affidavit of
probable cause so that partial closure necessarily followed from the sealing
of the affidavit.  The court added that a change of venue would require jury
selection from persons that "don't know anything about current events" and
that intensive voir dire would not work because potential jurors are not
always "totally frank about what they know about a case" and because they
may recall what they read only after the start of the trial.
     Following the hearing, the court granted the motion to suppress.  The
prosecutor dismissed the case in April of 1985.
     Appellants make four arguments on appeal:  (1) the proper standard for
any restriction on qualified First Amendment access rights is a demonstra-
tion of a substantial probability of irreparable damage to defendant's Sixth
Amendment rights; (2) the court's closure and sealing orders do not meet
this standard because they are based upon presumed damage and not actual
damage of defendant's rights; (3) the court inadequately considered
reasonable alternatives to closure and sealing; and (4) the restriction on
extra-judicial statements (the "gag order") is unjustified by the record and
is unconstitutionally overbroad.
     Although no party has contested the issue, we first look briefly at our
jurisdiction in this case.  We have held that the media may directly
intervene in a criminal proceeding for purposes of seeking access to
proceedings or papers.  State v. Tallman, 148 Vt. 465, 468,