MINNEAPOLIS (CN) — A coalition of media outlets motioned the Minnesota Fourth Judicial District on Wednesday to unseal information regarding the jurors in Derek Chauvin's murder trial.
The official motion was sent to the court shortly after 1:20 p.m., addressed to Judge Peter Cahill, Minnesota Assistant Attorney General Matthew Frank and Eric Nelson, Derek Chauvin's attorney. It requests that court officially and publicly release the identities of all jurors involved in Derek Chauvin's trial, as well as any other relevant information about them. The court originally stated that it would keep such information about the jurors sealed until Oct. 20, 2021.
More than 15 companies representing 24 different news outlets signed on to the motion to expedite the unsealing. One of the coalition's attorneys, Leita Walker, said in the motion that this reflects the great interest the public still has in the case; interest that will not be satisfied if information about the jurors is kept secret for another three months.
"The passage of time... [has] further demonstrated that the public interest in this case and the national reckoning to which it gave rise make transparency regarding the identities, backgrounds, and predilections of the people who handed down the verdict more important, not less," Walker said in the motion.
Chauvin, a former officer with the Minneapolis Police Department, killed George Floyd on May 25, 2020 over the suspicion that Floyd had used a counterfeit $20 bill at a local market; he kneeled on Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes. After Floyd's death sparked nationwide protests against police brutality and institutional white supremacy, Chauvin was arrested and charged with third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
Those charges were later changed; on April 20, 2021, the jury found Chauvin guilty of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. On June 25, Cahill sentenced him to 22.5 years in prison.
He is the first white police officer to be found guilty of murdering a Black man in Minnesota state history.
The motion to unseal information about the jurors who handed down this historic verdict was deliberately withheld, Walker said, until after the public furor over Chauvin's trial and Floyd's death had subsided.
"[This motion] has waited through trial, through verdict, through sentencing, and until now—more than three months after the jurors completed their service in the trial of Derek Chauvin—out of respect for the integrity of the proceedings, for the Court’s articulated concerns about juror impartiality and safety, and for the jurors themselves, who served their community under very difficult circumstances and handled harrowing evidence and testimony," Walker said.
Since Chauvin's sentencing in June, only two jurors — Brandon Mitchell and Journee Howard and one alternative juror, Lisa Christensen, have voluntarily come forward to discuss their experience. These jurors represent one Black, one mixed race and one white individual, respectively, from a jury consisting of with six white, four Black and two mixed-race individuals in total. With the national conversation around race and justice continuing into 2021, Walker argued in the motion that the public being able to access information about jurors would help inform that conversation.
"The public must be able to scrutinize jurors’ answers to the questionnaires, ask them to share their insights into the prosecution, consider what mattered to them, and yes, even decide whether the jury reached the right verdict for the right reasons," Walker said.
Finally, Walker argued that the release of jurors' identities and other relevant information is compulsory under Minnesota state law and the First Amendment.
"The Rules of Public Access to Records of the Judicial Branch define 'records' as 'any recorded information that is collected, created, received, maintained, or disseminated by a court or court administrator, regardless of physical form or method of storage.' Rule 3, subd. 5. Under this definition, the identities of jurors and prospective jurors, along with their profiles, questionnaires, and verdict forms are undoubtedly court records, and they are therefore presumptively public under the Rules and the common law: 'Records of all court and court administrators in the state of Minnesota are presumed to be open to any member of the public for inspection or copying at all times during the regular office hours of the custodian of the records,'” Walker argued.
She argued that jurors may remain anonymous only if a "strong reason" exists for the court to believe that their safety or impartiality is under threat. At present, she said, no such "strong reason" exists.
"The Media Coalition does not mean to make light of the unrest George Floyd’s murder caused. But much has changed in the months since the jury rendered that verdict, and at this juncture, resistance to releasing their names appears based on little more than a desire to have them left alone," Walker said. "That’s not enough."
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