Media/Recording Motions

Why do we need motions to record, anyway?

While the first amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees freedom of press, some courts have been known to limit media coverage of courtrooms, particularly by electronic media such as television, radio, and Internet. (For historical context and legal details, see the Memorandum, below.) Resistance to recording court proceedings is often expressed by prosecuting attorneys, who are generally quite reluctant to have the world see what goes on in court.

The documents provided here are those which I use, on a fairly regular basis, to cover court proceedings. It is my hope that this information proves useful to others seeking to do the same.

Media motions of the form shown here have proven successful in practice, and have been consistently granted by both Dover District Court and Strafford County Superior Court.

Warnings:

Note: These filings were created for specific cases, in specific courts, and on specific dates. If you wish to use one of these documents, you will need to change the names, dates, and other details to fit your particular case.

At the moment, there are no generic versions of these filings available. If you would like to help out by creating blank versions of these filings (with blanks for filling in the court name, defendant name, docket number, etc.), please feel free to do so. I just ask, if you create such forms, that you make them available on CLOG for other people to use. All the media filings on this page are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Note: The information found here is provided AS IS, with no warranty for ANY purpose. The filings posted here were not prepared by an attorney, and nothing on this page should be construed as legal advice. As always, it is recommended that you consult with counsel before filing any paperwork in a court of law.

The Motions

The following filings were intially used to convince Dover District Court that the first amendment applies to them. All three of these documents were first filed on May 19, 2009, along with a portfolio sampling some of my publications.

1. This Motion to Record was filed as both a representative of the media and as a pro se defendant.
2. This Media Petition asked the court for unlimited media access.
3. This Memorandum on Media Access was filed in support of the Motion to Record and Media Petition, above.

For routine requests to record proceedings, you may use this Motion to Record district court proceedings or this Motion to Record superior court proceedings.

Note: There are two different versions of the Motion to Record available: one for recording in district court, and one for recording in superior court. While the two forms of motion are quite similar, there are important differences. For example, the rule numbers cited in the motions are different for district and superior court rules. Make sure to select the proper motion for the court you intend to cover.