(Image source: Orlando Sentinel)
BY MALLORY PERRYMAN
ANCHOR MEGAN MURPHY
You're watching multisource U.S. news analysis from Newsy.
The names of the jurors in the Casey Anthony trial will remain secret -- for now. Judge Belvin Perry says Florida’s open records laws require him to make the names public -- but he will wait until October to do so.
An analyst on CNN explains, it comes down to privacy versus transparency.
Analyst (CNN): “It’s the issue of the balance of their privacy and the concern of threats against them versus the Sunshine laws... But I think there’s also something that’s very important here for everyone to remember and that’s this case is over. This is not a conviction where there is an appeal...Therefore there is no need for anybody, prosecution, defense, media to talk to these jurors.”
Phil Keating adds on Fox News -- Judge Perry made it clear -- he would make an exception if he could, but the law’s the law.
Phil Keating (Fox News): “It's almost unheard of in the American system of open society and open government and our judicial system that you have a very public trial with a public second verdict, yet the names of the jurors remain secret. ...Now Judge Perry's order suggests the Florida's legislature amend Sunshine Laws for high profile jury decisions such as this one.”
It wasn’t just Florida’s open records laws the judge took aim at in his ruling -- he also took a swipe at the frenzied media coverage of the trial, saying...
"’Clearly, the broadcast of an official and serious court proceeding...where a young girl was dead and her mother faced the death penalty devolved into cheap, soap-opera-like entertainment...’"
And the near-constant coverage of the trial seems to have created jurors out of the audience. After Casey Anthony’s acquittal...
ABC reports -- this sign appeared on the door of one Florida eatery.
And according to Fox News -- one juror even quit her job, and left town.
“She was basically, she said to her husband, terrified to go back to work.”
And then -- there are pictures like this -- signs that outraged trial followers may not be quick to forget.
But a criminal defense attorney tells CNN -- the only excuse anyone has to talk to the jurors, is to satisfy their own curiosity.
Michelle Suskauer (Criminal defense attorney): “There really is no good reason for anyone to contact them. Nothing would be positive. Every one of them was given a press pack at the end of the trial... Some of the jurors, I think three you said, took advantage of that and the rest want to be left alone. They did their civic duty and they want to be left alone.”
Judge Perry says the “cooling off” period will last until at least October 25th. To that -- a Gather blogger wonders...
“Does Judge Perry believe the public will forget by then?
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