Opinion ID: 552333
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Requirement of Disclosure Under Federal Jury Selection

Text: Rules 13 The Globe argues that denial of access to juror identities in this case violates the Jury Selection and Service Act of 1968, 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1861, et seq. (1982) 3 and the District of Massachusetts Plan for Random Selection of Jurors, Sec. 10(c), 4 which implements the Act in the District of Massachusetts. The Globe contends that these regulations carry a presumption of public access to petit jury lists which may be overcome only when the interests of justice so require. The Globe further argues that the reasons the district judge advanced here for withholding the names and addresses failed to meet the interests-of-justice standard. 14 We agree with the Globe on both counts. The local jury selection plan adopted by the District of Massachusetts pursuant to authority of the federal statute bars disclosure of the names of potential jurors until the persons called for jury service have appeared, or failed to appear, in response to the summons. The plan goes on to provide that [a]ny judge of this Court may order that the names of jurors remain confidential even thereafter if the interests of justice so require. (Emphasis provided.) The interests-of-justice language in the local rule conforms to the language found in 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1863(b)(7), authorizing local jury plans to permit district judges to keep confidential the names drawn from the jury wheel in any case where the interests of justice so require. 15 The second sentence in Sec. 1863(b)(7) is, to be sure, prefaced with the words, If the plan permits these names to be made public ..., suggesting that a local plan might optionally decline to permit juror names to be made public at all. This option was apparently inserted to allow 16 the present diversity of practice [around the nation] to continue. Some district courts keep juror names confidential for fear of jury tampering. [ 5 ] Other district courts routinely publicize the names. H.R.Rep. No. 1076, 90th Cong., 2d Sess., reprinted in 1968 U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1792, 1801. 17 The fact remains, nonetheless, that the District of Massachusetts has chosen to be in the latter camp--that is, to allow juror names to be made public after summons and appearance, and thereafter to permit impoundment of juror names only upon a judge's determination that the interests of justice so require. We need not interpret the statutory and constitutional consequences had the jury plan in question been otherwise. 18 It is also true that the material provisions of both the Act and the District of Massachusetts plan seem especially to address the period immediately after juror names are drawn from the jury wheel. But we think these provisions must be read also to control the release of names during the period after empanelment of a petit jury and until after its discharge. Section 1863(b)(7) specifies that a local plan may permit a judge to keep [jurors'] names confidential in any case where the interests of justice so require. (Emphasis supplied.) Any case can only refer to petit jurors since they alone are empanelled to sit in a given case. And the District of Massachusetts plan applies the interests-of-justice standard to confidentiality orders even thereafter--a period with no apparent limit. 19 We conclude, therefore, that in the District of Massachusetts juror names may be withheld (after the jurors have appeared or failed to appear in response to summons) only when a district judge specifically determines that the interests of justice so require. Absent that determination, the governing rule in the District of Massachusetts makes the juror identities publicly available information. 6