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Rochester judges: masters of their domain

By Mark Obbie

Here's a wonderful example of a local newspaper's commitment to public access to court records. David Andreatta of Rochester's Democrat & Chronicle demonstrates convincingly that local civil courts -- through carelessness or worse -- have routinely kept crucial documents out of publicly accessible files. In what one expert is quoted as calling "a bizarre local process," pleadings and other filings often went straight to the judge, rather than through a central clerk's office. Judges often held onto files as if they were their personal property and didn't bother checking whether documents eventually made their way into the clerk's office files. In many cases they did not, Andreatta found, including cases in which large sums of public money were at stake. Perhaps most alarming is an undercurrent evident in public officials' comments or internal memos, where they show that they consider Andreatta's requests to be seeking favors for the media. Though the Rochester judges' lapses are extreme, they show an all-too-common attitude -- that they are helping private parties settle disputes privately, rather than behaving like public servants using public resources to dispense justice.

Full post as published by Lawbeat on February 23, 2009 (boomark / email).