Winner Supports Reauthorization Of Cameras In The Courtroom

Albany, N.Y.-- State Senator George H. Winner, Jr. (R-C, Elmira) is co-sponsoring legislation in the Senate that would lift the ban on audio-visual coverage of New York State’s courtrooms.

"I have always been satisfied that New York State’s ‘cameras-in-the-courtroom’ experiment achieved its primary goal to heighten the public’s understanding of the state’s legal principles and court processes, and it did so without damaging the integrity of the courts," said Winner, who has long been a leading advocate of the move and, in fact, was a lead sponsor of the 1987 legislation that first established New York’s cameras-in-the-courtroom experiment.

New York is one of seven states that do not allow cameras in the courtroom. First banned in 1952, electronic coverage of New York’s courts was finally authorized by the Legislature on an 18-month experimental basis beginning on December 1, 1987. The experiment was extended by the Legislature several times over the next decade, but was allowed to permanently sunset on June 30, 1997.

Winner, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee which recently voted to report the legislation out of committee for consideration by the full Senate, said that panels appointed by the Legislature to examine the impact of the cameras-in-the-court experiment between 1987 and 1997 recommended overturning the ban.

"We’re working to establish an era of more openness and accountability throughout New York government, and it’s time to bring cameras back into our courtrooms," said Winner.

The legislation could enjoy strong bipartisan support in the Legislature this year, Winner said, and is alsosupported byGovernor Eliot Spitzer and New York State Chief Judge Judith Kaye.

The legislation Winner is co-sponsoring in the Senate would resume the state’s cameras-in-the-courtroom experiment as it existed in 1997, but with additional safeguards built in for children, crime victims and certain non-party witnesses. The measure would resume audio-visual coverage for a two-year period.

The last time New York State allowed cameras in the courts, the only protections that existed for children and crime victims -- other than sex offense victims -- was the discretion of the judge to deny or limit coverage of the proceedings. The new measure provides the following, stronger protections for children, crime victims and family court litigants by:

> creating a heightened standard for the courts to apply when considering whether to allow audio-visual coverage in family court proceedings; proceedings involving allegations of domestic violence, child abuse or neglect, or sexual abuse; any criminal proceeding where the victim objects to such coverage; and any proceeding where coverage is likely to have a substantial adverse effect on the welfare of a child;

> prohibiting coverage of the actual testimony of children and crime victims, unless they consent to coverage; and

> ensuring that non-party witnesses in family court proceedings have the right to exclude themselves from coverage.