PG Pub. Co. v. Com. By and Through Dist. Atty. of Erie County, Pa.

• Decision Date: 16 September 1992
• Citation: 532 Pa. 1,614 A.2d 1106
• Parties: , 20 Media L. Rep. 1737 PG PUBLISHING COMPANY d/b/a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Appellant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Acting By and Through the DISTRICT ATTORNEY of ERIE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA, Appellee. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania v. David C. COPENHEFER. Appeal of PG PUBLISHING COMPANY d/b/a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Page 1106

614 A.2d 1106

532 Pa. 1, 20 Media L. Rep. 1737

PG PUBLISHING COMPANY d/b/a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Appellant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Acting By and Through the

DISTRICT ATTORNEY of ERIE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA, Appellee.

COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania v. David C. COPENHEFER.

Appeal of PG PUBLISHING COMPANY d/b/a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued March 10, 1992.

Decided Sept. 16, 1992.

W. Thomas McGough, Jr., Debra H. Demody, Reed, Smith, Shaw & McClay, Pittsburgh, John Paul Garhart, Erie, for appellant.

Michael Cauley, Erie, for Reverend John Robinson.

William R. Cunningham, Dist. Atty., Erie, for appellee.

Before NIX, C.J., and LARSEN, FLAHERTY, McDERMOTT, ZAPPALA, PAPADAKOS and CAPPY, JJ.

OPINION

ZAPPALA, Justice.

This is an appeal from the Superior Court order 389 Pa.Super. 86, 566 A.2d 857 vacating the order of the Erie County Court of Common Pleas insofar as it allowed the media to have access to search warrants and supporting affidavits executed in connection with an ongoing criminal investigation into the kidnapping and murder of Sally Weiner. The matter was remanded for further proceedings. We granted allocatur to address the issue of whether the press and public have a right of access to inspect and copy search warrants and supporting affidavits. We now affirm.

On June 17, 1988, Pennbank branch manager Harry Weiner received a telephone call playing a recorded message from his wife, Sally, telling him that she had been kidnapped and that the kidnapper demanded ransom money from the bank. Mr. Weiner was given instructions to retrieve a bag from the parking lot outside of the bank. The bag contained additional directions. Instructions that were to follow then by radio were never given. Sally Weiner's body was discovered two days later. She had died as the result of a gunshot wound to the back of her head.

On June 20, 1988, David C. Copenhefer was charged with kidnapping, attempted robbery, and attempted extortion in connection with her death. The investigation into her death continued after Copenhefer's initial arrest, however, and Copenhefer was not charged with the murder until sometime later. ¹ During the investigation, the police obtained four search warrants from a district justice.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette sought access to the search warrants and supporting affidavits in the interim period between Copenhefer's initial arrest and the date that he was charged with murder. The District Attorney denied access to the documents. On June 28, 1988, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette filed a motion to intervene requesting authorization to inspect and copy the documents. The District Attorney subsequently filed a petition to seal the search warrants.

After a hearing on June 29, 1988, the trial court entered an order denying the Commonwealth's petition to seal the documents and granting leave to the Post-Gazette to intervene and to inspect and copy the documents. The order was stayed pending the appeal of the Commonwealth.

Cross-appeals were filed by the parties to the Superior Court. The Post-Gazette also filed an Application for Partial Supersedeas or To Vacate the Stay Pending Appeal that was denied by the Superior Court. The Superior Court vacated the order permitting access to the documents on the basis that the trial court had failed to articulate findings of fact considered necessary to a determination of whether the trial court's conclusion regarding the newspaper's access to the documents was adequately supported by the facts. The matter was remanded for further proceedings.

The Post-Gazette asserts that the press and public have a common law right of access to inspect and copy judicial records that extends to search warrants and underlying affidavits. The Post-Gazette relies extensively on this Court's opinion in Commonwealth v. Fenstermaker, 515 Pa. 501, 530 A.2d 414 (1987), in which we addressed the issue of press and public access to arrest warrants. The Post-Gazette argues that because the search warrants had been executed at the time it sought to intervene, the reasoning in Fenstermaker should control, and the search warrants should be subject to a presumptive right of access.

In Fenstermaker, the press had filed a motion to intervene and a motion for permission to inspect and copy affidavits of probable cause upon which arrest warrants had been issued after the arraignment of the accused, but prior to any preliminary hearings. The press was permitted to intervene and an order was entered by the common pleas court that recognized a right of public access to affidavits except in limited circumstances. The Commonwealth challenged the trial court's order, asserting that all such affidavits should be closed to public inspection until the guilt determining process was completed.

We held that the threshold inquiry in a case where a common law right of access is asserted is whether the documents are public judicial documents. Documents that are filed with district justices are judicial documents "... for the decision to issue a warrant is itself a judicial one reflecting a determination that the affidavits and the information contained therein provide a sufficient basis upon which to justify an arrest." Fenstermaker, 515 Pa. at 509 530 A.2d at 418. A document is not a public judicial document, however, simply because it is generated in connection with judicial proceedings.

In determining whether the affidavits supporting the arrest warrants were public in nature, we addressed in Fenstermaker the policy considerations that favored accessibility. We stated that,

The tradition of keeping proceedings and records of the criminal justice system open to public observation is founded in common law right, and as stated in Nixon v. Warner Communications, Inc., 435 U.S. 589, 597, 98 S.Ct. 1306, 1312, 55 L.Ed.2d 570, 579 (1978) (footnotes omitted), "It is clear that the courts of this country recognize a general right to inspect and copy public records and documents, including judicial records and documents." There is a presumption--however gauged--in favor of public access to judicial records." Id. at 602, 98 S.Ct. at 1314, 55 L.Ed.2d at 582.

515 Pa. at 508, 530 A.2d at 418. Public access to arrest warrant affidavits fosters important policy considerations, such as discouraging perjury, enhancing police and prosecutorial performance, and promoting a public perception of fairness in the arrest warrant process.

We held that there is a common law right of access to arrest warrant affidavits. We noted that the right to inspect judicial documents is not absolute, however, and supervisory power over such documents rests in the courts. "Where the presumption of openness attached to a public judicial document is outweighed by circumstances warranting closure of the document to public inspection, access to the document may be denied." 515 Pa. at 513, 530 A.2d at 420.

We held that the supporting affidavits for arrest warrants are open to public inspection unless a court order sealing the documents has been entered. The decision regarding access to the arrest warrant affidavits is left to the sound discretion of the trial court. Access to the affidavits may not be denied merely on the request of a district attorney or defense counsel. The trial court may seal the documents, however, on a showing, inter alia, that a defendant's fair trial rights may be affected, that the safety of informants must be protected, or that the integrity of an ongoing criminal investigation may be compromised.

The Commonwealth asserts that the analysis in Fenstermaker should not be extended to search warrants because of the distinction between the investigatory and accusatorial stages of the proceedings. While we do not fail to recognize that the purposes of arrest warrants and search warrants differ, the differences do not compel a conclusion that search warrants are not public records once the warrants have been executed. ²

A search warrant is a public judicial document. There is no historical tradition of public access to search warrant proceedings. As with arrest warrants, however, the search warrant application is filed with district justices who are part of...