Court Opinion

ID: 9538447
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:36:34.46026+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:57:52.738522
License: Public Domain

Gunderson, J.,
concurring and dissenting:
I agree with Justice Batjer’s view that district courts have no lawful franchise to censor grand jury reports before they are filed and made public. I also agree that this court has no lawful franchise to interject one person, a district judge, between the public’s right to know and evaluate a grand jury’s actions. If citizens, on occasion, believe that a particular grand jury has exceeded its lawful authority, then I submit it is more appropriate to require the persons thus arguably aggrieved to present their contentions, as was done in this case, through public proceedings for expungement. We should not constitute district judges the final censors of the public issues considered by grand juries, in closed proceedings forever veiled in secrecy.
In the instant case, I can agree that the grand jury exceeded its lawful authority, in dwelling on activities in the state of Montana. Also, without indicting those accused, the grand jury rather clearly implied that criminal conduct occurred during the association of public officials and the petitioner. Thus, in my view, although the district court did not have authority to restrain the grand jury from announcing their views on such matters, the petitioner is entitled to have such views declared to be in excess of the jury’s lawful authority.