Opinion ID: 390302
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Concerns About Initial Admissibility of the Tapes

Text: 70 The district court expressed concern about the correctness of its initial decision concerning admissibility of the tapes which it weighed as another factor justifying denial of the broadcasters' application. The district court reaffirmed its original view that the rulings were correct but candidly stated that the issue is certainly not free from doubt. 501 F.Supp. at 862. We will not reach to decide the substantive issue of the propriety of the original ruling on admissibility since it arises here only in a tangential proceeding but is likely to come before this court more directly on appeal from the convictions. Whatever the validity of the original ruling, the tapes were in fact admitted into evidence, their contents publicized, and the transcripts of the tapes released to the press. Thus, whatever privacy right defendants may have claimed in such tapes is irretrievably lost, and if any remedy remains, it must perforce be confined to appellate action with regard to the underlying conviction. It would unduly narrow the right of access were it to be confined to evidence properly admitted, since the right is based on the public's interest in seeing and knowing the events which actually transpired. Our prior comments distinguishing between defendants and innocent victims are also applicable in regard to this factor.