Our judiciary must be more transparent

Re: “Shrouded justice,” July 15 news story and “‘Shrouded justice’ uncovers court secrecy in need of reform,” July 22 Post editorial

The Denver Post must be applauded for its in depth look at the practice of suppressing court cases from the public eye. But it missed the mark in applauding attorney general candidate George Brauchler for promising to move towards transparency.

In the last two months his office has fought all the way to the Colorado Supreme Court to block news media access to court documents regarding malfeasance of his employees. In the last month his office has also fought to prevent the NAACP from accessing a redacted set of court transcripts so they could weigh in on whether a capital sentencing hearing was tainted by issues of race in Brauchler’s district and by Brauchler’s employees.

A politician’s promise to alter his practices in a bid for higher office doesn’t mean he will actually change and Brauchler’s actual practices show he is not a fan of transparency. As the saying goes, “You can wrap a rotten fish in a piece of paper called change and it’s still going to stink.” Jim Castle, Denver

“A frightening black hole of judicial secrecy exists in Colorado,” your editorial stated. But what’s concerning is that you’ve only discovered a portion of the problem.

As for the judges who make the decisions to seal or suppress the records?

1. They’re nominated by politically-imbalanced commissions that work in complete darkness;

2. They’re disciplined in secret because judicial discipline proceedings are “confidential” in Colorado. You don’t even know whether any of the suppressed or sealed cases involve a judge as a defendant; and

3. They’re protected by a retention evaluation process where uninformed commissions shed little light on their qualifications.

And the “black hole of judicial secrecy”? It grows because in November, most Coloradans will feed it by voting to retain judges they know little, if anything, about.

Please sign a petition at judicialintegrity.org to tell legislators we demand transparency and accountability in the judicial branch. Chris Forsyth, The Judicial Integrity Project, Wheat Ridge