Colorado judge bars school from releasing James Holmes documents

Los Angeles Times ^ | July 26, 2012 | By Michael Muskal

[Cincinatus' Wife]

............On Monday, the judge issued a gag order barring the defense team, the prosecution team and law-enforcement agencies involved in the case from speaking to the media.

On Wednesday, the judge reaffirmed his original order after several media outlets, lead by Fox News.com and the Denver Post, reported that Holmes had sent a notebook to a psychiatrist at the University of Colorado Denver, Anschutz campus. The notebook reportedly contained details of the planning for the shooting rampage, according to unnamed law enforcement sources quoted by the media. That could be important for the prosecution in showing that the suspect acted with deliberation and calculation.

Sylvester on Monday also signed an order barring the university, where Holmes was a former graduate student in the neuroscience program, from releasing any records about the defendant. Several news organizations, including the Los Angeles Times and the Associated Press, have filed requests for the records, which could give some insight into how Holmes, described by friends and teachers in Southern California as a brilliant science student, may have changed under the pressure of a new environment and scholastic program.

........What might be slightly unusual in this case is how soon the curtain has begun to be lowered, especially when it comes to the order on the school records.

Mark Caramanica, freedom of information director at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, told the Associated Press that the order was “highly unorthodox.” He said it was unusual that a public institution would consult with an outside entity instead of just following the law and answering the request.

“It seems very premature for a court to get involved and make such a sweeping order,” Caramanica said. “It seems like a very broad and overly aggressive approach.”

[ETL]

"Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars and apartments. Bring the revolution home, kill your parents, that's where it's really at"
--Bill Ayers (1970), quoted in New York Times, September 11, 2001:

Article: "No Regrets for a Love Of Explosives; In a Memoir of Sorts, a War Protester Talks of Life With the Weathermen"
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E1DE1438F932A2575AC0A9679C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1>
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"Dig It. First they killed those pigs [ie, rich people], then they ate dinner in the same room with them, they even shoved a fork into a victim’s stomach! Wild!"
-Weather Underground leader and wife of Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn, referring to the Manson murders

Article: Allies in War -by David Horowitz
FrontPageMagazine.com | Monday, September 17, 2001
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=63512670-BF7C-42A0-B41D-5D0FB9E09C09
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Bill Ayers: "I considered myself partly an anarchist then and I consider myself partly an anarchist now. I mean, I'm as much an anarchist as I am a Marxist which is to say I find a lot of the ideas in anarchism appealing."

[Valpal1]

I dunno, one of the things that will help reduce these mass killings is ending the media charnal fest.

They are also polluting both potential witnesses and the jury pool with speculation and misinformation while simultaneously inspiring isolated malcontents and borderline personalities around the globe.

There are times when I wish a judge could issue a STFU order to the media rather than a gag order to the participants in the investigation.