Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 22, 1990 TAG: 9003222073
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
In an opinion by Chief Justice William Rehnquist, the court upheld a ruling by a federal appeals court last year that invalidated a portion of Florida's grand jury secrecy law.
Fifteen other states have similar secrecy provisions, which under the court's ruling also are now invalid.
The chief justice said that while preserving grand jury secrecy was "important," that goal could not outweigh an individual's constitutional right to make a "truthful public statement" about his own testimony once the investigation is over.
The court addressed only one aspect of grand jury secrecy: a permanent ban, extending beyond the expiration of a grand jury's term, that prevents witnesses from ever disclosing their own testimony.
The ruling left states free to bar such disclosures while the grand jury's investigation is continuing.
The case was brought by a Florida reporter, Michael Smith of The Charlotte Herald-News in Charlotte County, who had alleged that law enforcement officials had conspired 10 years earlier to cover up the killing of an 18-year-old.
Smith testified to a grand jury about what he had learned, but wanted to continue writing about the subjects. He sued for a declaration that the secrecy provision was unconstitutional.
The U.S. District Court in Jacksonville upheld the law, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta ruled in Smith's favor.
The appeals court based its decision principally on a 1978 Supreme Court ruling, Landmark Communications v. Virginia, which held that a state could not prosecute a newspaper for publishing information about a judicial discipline proceeding that was required by law to be kept confidential.
Landmark Communications owns a number of newspapers - among them the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot and Ledger-Star, the Roanoke Times & World-News and the Greensboro News & Record - as well as TV and radio stations.
The company was indicted, convicted and fined $500 under a Virginia law that made it a crime to report about a state judicial commission's confidential inquiries into a judge's fitness to hold office.
by CNB