Judge: We're not Germany or Russia * Thompson orders children's custody hearing open to public
Thursday, April 21, 2005 8:48 AM EDT
Mike Spector
Cecil Circuit Court Judge Dexter M. Thompson Jr. decried lawyers' arguments that a child custody hearing should be closed to the public Wednesday, saying such a move would be akin to creating atmospheres similar to historically totalitarian states.
The heated exchange came at the start of a hearing in which the county's social services department attempted to retain custody of John Joseph Dougherty's three daughters. Dougherty, 53, faces a second-degree murder charge after police found his brain-damaged wife dead on a mattress, surrounded by moldy food and her own excrement.
"Maybe we should be more like Germany or Russia," the judge said when asked to close the hearing.
Attorneys representing the social services department, Dougherty and the three children argued that the hearing should be closed by law. They cited a law that says the court must close the hearing if it "involves discussion of confidential information from the child abuse and neglect report and record, or any information obtained from the child welfare agency concerning a child or family who is receiving ... child welfare services or ... foster care or adoption assistance."
The request to close the hearing stemmed from the presence of a Cecil Whig reporter in the courtroom. The attorneys argued that media coverage caused one of Dougherty's daughters to change schools and worried that the children would be subject to harassment if the substance of the hearing was published.
But the judge said the attorneys failed to show any information would come out in the hearing that would compel him to close it. "What is gonna come out here that's different than any other case we hear?" the judge asked.
Thompson then said the United States was becoming increasingly secretive and said the court had an "obligation to remain open."
Michael Scibinico, the social services attorney, immediately asked the judge to delay the hearing so the agency could appeal his ruling. But the judge waved his hand and said, "The court's not going to do that."
Thompson's decision to keep the hearing open was in direct contrast to a ruling made by Judge Richard Eli Jackson before an emergency custody hearing in the same case.
The social services department gained custody of Dougherty's children Feb. 28 after that emergency hearing. The hearing came a few days after Dougherty's initial arrest.
Jackson, reading the same law attorneys argued in front of Thompson, decided he was forced to close the hearing under the circumstances.
Jackson said at the time that it was the county court's practice to remain open to the public but that the law mandated he close the particular hearing.
That should be Cecil Whig in the above post