The Press & the Courts

No matter how shocking the charges against him, every American accused of a crime is entitled to a fair trial before twelve unbiased jurors. Yet whatever tactics the defense tries -- change of venue, peremptory challenges or cautionary instructions to the jury -- all may be futile in a day when mass me dia confront potential jurors with everything from the murder weapon to the victim's widow. Such "prejudicial reporting" or pretrial press publicity has caused appellate courts to overturn more and more convictions.

There have been many reminders of the kind of reporting the courts condemn. Most recently it was the case of Ohio Osteopath Dr. Sam Sheppard. In freeing him, a federal judge blasted Cleveland newspapers for "trying" Sheppard ("a mockery of justice") with such editorial outbursts as GET THAT KILLER (TiME, July 24). For their part, newsmen refuse to surrender the right of the press to alert and inform the public. Though they may err on the side of sensationalism, their job is al ways to dig out all the facts. The Constitution, after all, guarantees a free press just as firmly as it does due process. The tough problem here, as it frequently is in the law, is to balance both cherished values.

Newsmen argue that defense and prosecution lawyers must share the blame for press abuses. The American Bar Association is ready to concede that lawyers have much to answer for. Scheduled for passage by the House of Delegates this week at the association's annual convention in Manhattan is a stern new canon of ethics:

"It is the duty of a lawyer engaged either in the prosecution or the defense of a person accused of a crime to refrain from any action which might interfere with the right of either the accused or the prosecuting governmental entity to a fair trial. To that end it is improper and professionally reprehensible for a lawyer so engaged to express to the public or in any manner extrajudicially any opinion or prediction as to the guilt or innocence of the accused, the weight of the evidence against him or the likelihood that he will be either convicted or acquitted."

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