Document Type
Article
Publication Date
10-3-2022
Abstract
Trial court judges in 2020 were faced with a remarkable new problem. They were asked to accommodate both public health concerns (preventing trial participants, jurors, and spectators from contracting COVID-19) and criminal defendants’ Sixth Amendment right to a public trial. As courts of appeal begin their review of cases alleging violations of the Sixth Amendment’s right to a public trial arising during the early pandemic, they should be careful to consider conditions as they were at the time. We have learned much about COVID-19 and its management since then. But reviewing courts should not demand that trial courts possess public health expertise (or information) they did not have in 2020.
Automated Citation
99 Denver Law Review Forum 1