State v. Whitney

2005 VT 102, 885 A.2d 1200, 178 Vt. 435, 2005 Vt. LEXIS 240

• Court: Supreme Court of Vermont
• Decided: August 19, 2005
• Docket: 04-293
• Status: Published

Opinions

Allen, CJ.

¶ 1. (Ret.), Specially Assigned. In this interlocutory appeal, defendant argues that the district court erred by denying his motion to seal a competency report that he claims was not formally admitted into evidence during the competency hearing. We affirm.

¶ 2. Defendant was arraigned on a charge of first-degree murder in June 2004. After learning at the arraignment that defendant had attempted suicide, the district court ordered that he undergo a competency evaluation. An evaluation was conducted, and a report was filed with the court on June 23,2004. A competency hearing was held on July 7, 2004. At the hearing, defense counsel and the state’s attorney presented the court with a written stipulation stating that defendant was competent to stand trial. The state’s attorney emphasized that the stipulation was based on the competency report’s findings and conclusions. The court stated that it would accept the stipulation because the report supported it. Concerned that the court may have “accepted” the report, defense counsel stated that he wanted the report to be part of the record, but he was not offering it into evidence because he did not want the press to have access to it. Defendant argued that § 6(b)(19) of the Rules for Public Access to Court Records denied public access to the competency report because the report had not been admitted into evidence. When the court reiterated that it had relied upon the report, and that the report was part of the record, defendant moved to seal the report, relying primarily on his interpretation of § 6(b)(19).

¶ 3. The court concluded that while it respected the parties’ stipulation, it had a duty to make an independent evaluation of competency based on the record, and that the record included the report, which provided an adequate factual basis for a finding of competency. The court also concluded .that defendant had failed to demonstrate that releasing.the report would prejudice him. On appeal, defendant argues that there is no presumptive First Amendment right of access to competency reports not admitted into evidence, and that the trial court erred by denying defendant’s motion to seal the instant competency report because it had not been admitted into evidence.

¶ 4. As a preliminary matter, we reiterate that defendant’s motion to seal before the trial court was based primarily, if not exclusively, on his claim that court rules did not allow public access to the competency report because the report had not been admitted into evidence at the competency hearing. Defendant only vaguely argued that releasing the report could prejudice him, and on appeal he merely repeats in a single sentence that the report is likely to prejudice him in a pending civil suit and his criminal trial.

¶5. The dissent disagrees with our assessment that defendant’s focus in challenging release of the competency report was based almost exclusively on the public access rules, and criticizes the trial court for not approaching defendant’s vague claims of prejudice with more “judicial vigor.” We find no support, however, for the dissent’s view that the trial court gave “short shrift” to balancing defendant’s right to a fair trial against the public’s right to access court records. Defendant’s desire not to see some unspecified information in the report reach the public was hardly sufficient to require the court to find a substantial probability that a compelling interest of defendant’s would be harmed if the public gained access to the report. At the hearings below, apart from the parties’ extended debate over whether the competency report had been admitted into evidence, defendant’s attorney merely noted, by way of explanation for why his client wanted the report sealed, that he had “gotten wind of the potential for a civil suit,” and that he had “some concerns ... that some of the contents of this report would prejudice” defendant. We find nothing in the record, however, specifying what those concerns were or which contents of the report might have been prejudicial to defendant if released to the public.

¶ 6. In response to defendant’s vague claim of prejudice, the trial court balanced the limited information presented to it and concluded that defendant would not be harmed if the public gained access to the report. The court stated that information concerning defendant’s medical background in the report was not particularly distressing in nature, and expressed doubt that defendant’s right to a fair trial would be affected by the release of any information in the report. See State v. Tallman, 148 Vt. 465, 474, 537 A.2d 422, 427 (1987) (“[I]n the overwhelming majority of criminal trials, pretrial publicity presents few unmanageable threats to the accused’s right to a fáir trial.” (internal quotations omitted)). The court later noted that the report contained nothing that had not already been in the newspaper, to which defense counsel responded only that there was also the matter of a potential civil lawsuit. In short, notwithstanding the dissent’s claims to the contrary, defendant had every opportunity to demonstrate prejudice, but failed to do so.

¶ 7. On appeal, defendant summarily contends that release of the report is likely to prejudice him, without any further explanation. Because defendant has failed to challenge the trial court’s finding that releasing the report would not prejudice him, and because we conclude that the competency report in this case was available to the public under our Rules for Public Access to Court Records, we need not consider defendant’s claim that there is no constitutional presumptive right to access competency reports. See State v. Curtis, 157 Vt. 275, 277, 597 A.2d 770, 772 (1991) (“Under longstanding practice and precedent, we must not consider constitutional questions unless the disposition of the case requires it.”). As we stated in In re Sealed Documents, 172 Vt. 152, 156, 772 A.2d 518, 523 (2001), in which we declined to resolve whether the First Amendment required public access to certain court records, “[o]ur tradition of addressing issues of constitutional significance only when the matter is squarely and necessarily presented counsels restraint and forebearance as to the broader questions of access on these alternative grounds.” The dissent faults the trial court for failing to fulfill its duty to determine whether providing public access to the competency report would impair defendant’s constitutional rights, but defendant failed to adequately present any claim of prejudice, and, to the extent that he did, the trial court rejected such a claim.

¶ 8. In sum, defendant’s motion to seal the competency report was made to keep the whole report out of the public domain based on defendant’s interpretation of § 6(b)(19) of the Rules for Public Access to Court Records. This was an ineffective and inappropriate use of a motion to seal. Under § 7(a) of the rules, the purpose of such a motion is to “seal from public access a record to which the public otherwise has. access” or to “redact information from a record to which the public has access.” The motion can be granted on a finding of case-specific “good cause” and “exceptional circumstances.” Defendant never seriously tried to demonstrate “good cause” or “exceptional circumstances.” The dissent makes some good points about factors defendant might have cited in arguing good cause and exceptional circumstances in support of redaction of parts of the report. Unfortunately, defendant did not cite these factors. Nor, as noted, did defendant develop his argument that prejudice would result from disclosure of the report and he would be adversely affected in a civil suit. Thus, at most, defendant sought a declaration that the record was excluded from public access by § 6(b)(19), a claim properly denied, as discussed below.

¶ 9. We now turn to the Rules for Public Access to Court Records. The purpose of these rules is to “provide a comprehensive policy on public access to Judicial Branch records.” Rules for Public Access to Court Records § 1. The general policy established by those rules is that “all case and administrative records of the Judicial Branch shall be open to any member of the public for inspection or to obtain copies.” Id. § 4. Therefore, “all case records” are open to the public unless they fall into the exceptions set forth in § 6(b). Id. § 6(a). The only applicable exception in this case is § 6(b)(19), which provides that the public shall not have access to “evaluation^] by a mental health professional to determine the competency to stand trial and/or sanity of a criminal defendant, if not admitted into evidence.” In other words, the public is allowed access to competency evaluations that are admitted into evidence.

¶ 10. Defendant argues that § 6(b)(19) precludes public access to the instant competency report because neither defense counsel nor the state’s attorney offered the report into evidence, and the trial court never formally admitted the report into evidence. We find defendant’s technical argument unconvincing. By statute, when the court orders a competency evaluation, the psychiatrist preparing the report must send the resulting report to the court that ordered the evaluation. 13 V.S.A. § 4816(b). Moreover, “[t]he relevant portion” of the report “shall be admitted into evidence as an exhibit on the issue of the person’s mental competency to stand trial and the opinion therein shall be conclusive on the issue if agreed to by the parties and if found by the court to be relevant and probative on the issue.” Id. § 4816(d) (emphasis added). In this case, the court ordered a competency evaluation pursuant to 13 V.S.A. § 4814(a), and the psychiatrist sent the resulting report to the court. The court then held a hearing on defendant’s competency. At the hearing, the parties presented the court with a written stipulation as to defendant’s competency based on the findings and conclusions in the competency report. The court accepted the parties’ stipulation because the report supported it, stating that the report was the factual basis for its finding of competency. In doing so, the court acknowledged the parties’ stipulation, but emphasized that it had a duty to make an independent judgment based on the record, which in this case was the competency report.

¶ 11. Under these circumstances, the report was available to the public. State law required the competency report to be admitted into evidence, and the court, for all practical purposes, admitted the report into evidence, relying upon the report’s findings and conclusions in determining that it would accept the parties’ stipulation of defendant’s competency. Therefore, the competency report is not covered by § 6(b)(19) and is accessible to the public under § 6(a).

¶ 12. The dissent would reverse the trial court’s order and remand the matter based on the court’s failure to reconcile § 6(b)(19) with § 4816(d). Specifically, the dissent contends that the trial court failed to exercise its discretion to admit into evidence only “the relevant portion” of the competency report, as required under § 4816(d). According to the dissent, the only relevant portion of the competency report would have been the psychiatrist’s conclusions as to defendant’s ability to stand trial. We decline to follow this reasoning. First, defendant has not raised this argument on appeal, and did not do so below. Indeed, defendant argued only that § 6(b)(19) precluded public access to the report in its entirety, and did not ask the court to prevent access to specified portions of the report. Second, the trial court had no evidence before it other than the parties’ stipulation and the report. The court stated that the report — and the report alone — contained the factual basis for its finding of competency. Considering the court’s duty to make an independent assessment of whether defendant was competent, we cannot assume that, under these circumstances, the court needed to rely only on the psychiatrist’s conclusions concerning defendant’s ability to stand trial, without considering the factual bases underlying those conclusions. Taken to its logical conclusion, the dissent’s proposal would mean that, even when a competency report is admitted into evidence, the only part of the report that is ever available to the public is the psychiatrist’s conclusions. That is not the law.

Affirmed.