Court Opinion

ID: 9853290
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:45:56.489491+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:44.338352
License: Public Domain

Fromme, J.,
dissenting. The proper test for determining the extent of a reporter’s privilege of confidentiality of information and news sources in a particular criminal case depends upon a balancing of the need of a defendant for a fair trial against the reporter’s need for confidentiality. This is the test adopted by the majority of this court based upon Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U.S. 665, 33 L.Ed.2d 626, 92 S.Ct. 2646 (1972).
A disclosure of information and news services should be required only in those cases where it is shown the information in possession of the news reporter is material to prove some element of the defense, to reduce the gradation of the offense charged, or to mitigate the possible sentence to be imposed.

The defense of Milda R. Sandstrom in the murder case was insanity.

At the hearing on the motion to compel disclosure the petitioner testified as to the approximate date, time, and place of the gathering at which a state’s witness had threatened to kill Thad Sandstrom. I fail to see how the name of the newsman’s informant, who had not actually heard the threat but had been told of it by someone else, could possibly have any materiality in proving some element of the defense of insanity, in reducing the gradation of the offense charged, or in mitigating the possible sentence to be imposed. The information sought was not, in my opinion, material to the defense in the case and did not justify the trial court’s action in refusing to recognize the limited privilege, finding the newsman in contempt of court, and sentencing him to sixty days in jail.