PA Bill Number: HB2235
Title: Providing for regulation of the meat packing and food processing industry by creating facility health and safety committees in the workplace; ...
Description: Providing for regulation of the meat packing and food processing industry by creating facility health and safety committees in the workplace; ... ...
Last Action: Referred to LABOR AND INDUSTRY
Last Action Date: Apr 25, 2024
Baltimore Atty Mosby Seeks Order to Keep Freddie Gray Autopsy Secret :: 06/04/2015
The Baltimore Sun reports that state's Attorney Marilyn Mosby plans to seek a protective order blocking the release of Freddie Gray's autopsy and other "sensitive" documents as she pursues charges against the six police officers involved in his arrest and death.
In a court filing Monday, Mosby requested "a protective order to restrict the dissemination of such sensitive discovery in this matter" and also sought a gag order to prevent those involved in the case from discussing it in public. She asked as well for the court to give the State more time to respond to defense motions that she and her office be removed from the case and that it be tried outside Baltimore.
Today attorney Ivan Bates, who represents one of the six officers, said that the protective order is a sign that "there is something in that autopsy report that they are trying to hide":
Mrs. Mosby is the one who did an announcement discussing what she said the evidence was in a nationally televised speech, and now that it is time to turn over the evidence, to ask for a protective order is beyond disingenuous. It's as if she wants to do everything to make sure our clients do not get a fair trial.
Bates said the protective order would be even more restrictive of transparency in the case than a gag order:
Nobody would know anything but the State and the defense, so they would totally hide it from the public. If your case is as good as you said it was, why don't you just show the evidence? …You can't holler and say, "I'm about accountability for the citizens," and then run around filing for a protective order.
Mosby filed charges against six officers involved in Gray's arrest on May 1. Sgt. White, Lt. Brian Rice and Officers Caesar Goodson, William Porter, Edward Nero and Garrett Miller were indicted on May 21.
Michael Belsky, the "designated contact attorney" for all of the officers, agreed to give the State more time to respond to the motions to dismiss the case due to prosecutorial misconduct and for Mosby to recuse her office from the case, but only "in exchange for the State releasing certain discovery," including Gray's autopsy report, medical records and "all statements made by the defendants." He did not agree to give the state more time to respond to the motion to remove the case from Baltimore, the filing said.
Gag orders like the one sought by Mosby are often requested in cases where media scrutiny is particularly intense, reports the Baltimore Sun. Gregg Leslie, legal defense director for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said judges sometimes grant them in high-profile cases because of the heightened scrutiny.
But Leslie said that Mosby's office should have to provide a full explanation for why it believes a protective order is warranted — especially considering Gray's death removed standard concerns about his medical privacy:
They should have to show there is a compelling state interest served by keeping this confidential, and that their solution is the most narrowly tailored one.
http://www.truthrevolt.org/news/baltimore-atty-mosby-seeks-order-keep-freddie-gray-autopsy-secret
