Cameras, funded by the prosecutor’s office, allow Warren County Prosecutor David Fornshell to view and to hear activities in at least two courtrooms, even when court is not in session.
“This raises all sorts of issues — attorney/client privilege and separation of witnesses who could be listening to the trial in the prosecutor’s office,” Kaspar said.
According to Fornshell, the cameras were installed with the blessing of the three Common Pleas Judges, and the feed to his office is the same audio feed that goes to the media rooms that overlook each courtroom.
“This is the same audio feed that the media is hearing,” Fornshell told this newspaper earlier this month.
Lebanon attorney Charles H. Rittgers sent a letter to the three Common Pleas Judges — Donald Oda II, James Flannery and Robert Peeler — after learning about the cameras.
“I am not accusing anyone of any wrongdoing, but I am respectfully asking that the audio/visual feed leading to the prosecutor’s office be terminated and that the court be very judicious in how microphones and other cameras are used in our courtrooms,” Rittgers said in the letter obtained by this newspaper.
In a letter sent to the bar association on Aug. 19, Warren County Administrative Judge Donald Oda said, “Right now, we do not have the ability to stream live to the Internet. However, due to the recent interest these feeds have generated, we are looking to transmitting the feeds into the attorney waiting area next to the stairwell and to the law library. That way, anyone who wants to watch or listen can view the feed remotely, without having to go and sit in each of the courtrooms.”
Oda added, “The judges would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that courtrooms are public places. Ohio law is quite clear: judges must permit the broadcasting, recording and photographing of court proceedings. The public’s right to an open courtroom must be balanced with that rights of the litigants to a fair trial. We believe technology in the courtroom strikes the proper balance between these sometimes competing interests and we try to be vigilant against misuse.”
But during the well-attended meeting, the bar association unanimously voted to appoint a committee to explore the system to determine exactly how it is operating, according to Kaspar.
“The committee will look at the genesis of the system as you will, how it is being used and how it was implemented,” said Attorney David Ernst, president of the Warren County Bar Association.
He said the committee would be moving quickly and possibility suggest changes in the future.
Fornshell said he could not attend the meeting because he was preparing for an upcoming capital murder case “and therefore I am unable to comment.”
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