Casual Contempt

Laws in every State provide some measure of secrecy for grand jury activities, but newspapers habitually get around the law with the weasel-phrase "it was reported that. ..." Fortnight ago in Akron able, ambitious Common Pleas Judge Walter B. Wanamaker, 43, decided to prove Ohio's hazy law in the matter, forbade newspaper accounts of grand jury proceedings. Barked he: "There has been too much trying of lawsuits in newspapers instead of courts, particularly in criminal cases." Immediately the Scripps-Howard Times-Press published names of jurors and witnesses, listed titles of cases to be heard by a newly-summoned panel. Cited for contempt of court, chunky, mustached Editor Walter Morrow was last week fined $50. Between Judge Wanamaker and Editor Morrow there was no feud, but an understanding that the case would be appealed immediately to make the spirit & letter of the law jibe once & for all.

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