Court Opinion

ID: 9944895
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-02-26 18:45:30.515027+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:24:03.372612
License: Public Domain

I concur in the judgment. I write separately, however, because I do not believe this case requires us to set down a yardstick rule for future hearings.
We are all in agreement that defendant's fair trial rights cannot be prejudiced by publicity, whether leaked against a judge's order, or otherwise in the normal course of events.
We are agreed that the trial court's duty is to hold a hearing whenever necessary to ascertain whether a fair trial is jeopardized. Since that did not *Page 1103 
take place in this case we correctly nullify the contempt finding. We need go no further in this writ proceeding.
This court should not enter the legal thicket of creating a bright-line test for such similar hearings in the future. The debate over "substantial probability" or "reasonable likelihood" is one that will always be heavily nuanced by the unique facts of each case. We are here visiting extra work on trial courts in high publicity cases which often may result in the proverbial exercise of fitting a square peg into a round hole. I would defer to the Supreme Court, which is in a position to decide this matter definitively.
A petition for a rehearing was denied August 13, 1996, and petitioners' application for review by the Supreme Court was denied November 20, 1996. *Page 1104