Should cameras be allowed in jury rooms?


	Jeffrey Toobin: "In virtually every case, when cameras and scrutiny and journalists and outsiders have been able to look at how our system works and expose it, it gets better."

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(CNN) -- The debate over cameras in the courtroom has long divided the legal community but the newest twist is whether cameras should be allowed in the jury room.

The PBS program "Frontline" recently asked a Texas judge to permit cameras in the jury room to videotape deliberations in a capital murder trial. To everyone's surprise, the judge said yes. The district attorney was outraged.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals heard arguments on the decision Wednesday and Texas lawmakers are working on a bill to outlaw cameras in the jury rooms from now on.

Would allowing cameras to videotape jury deliberations do great harm to the wheels of justice or shine more light on how the process works? CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin and Court TV's Catherine Crier took sides and argued the case Wednesday with "Crossfire" hosts Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson.

CARLSON: Jeffrey Toobin, there are not cameras in the men's room and there are not cameras in jury rooms. And with a few exceptions, there never have been. Why do you suppose that is?

TOOBIN: Because the tradition in our legal system has been one of great secrecy and keeping the public out. And in virtually every case, when cameras and scrutiny and journalists and outsiders have been able to look at how our system works and expose it, it gets better. Because as Justice Brandeis said, "Sunlight is the best disinfectant," and it will be here too.

BEGALA: Catherine Crier, [you're] a former state district judge in our beloved Texas, the judge in this case, Ted Poe, said this. "I believe we have the best system there ever has been. We shouldn't be ashamed of how it works." ...

Now, I know you were a judge, but why should you run Judge Poe's courtroom for him?


Catherine Crier: "Cameras in the courtroom will change what we have had for centuries and what the people of this country seem to think is a valuable service in the criminal justice system."

CRIER: Well, I think that we're comparing apples and oranges. To go into a system that is supposed to operate in a certain fashion with rules of evidence and certain behavior by attorneys and judges, we want to make sure that that is comporting ...

But do we want to go into say a grand jury proceeding that is supposed to be secret...

BEGALA: Yes.

CRIER: ... just because they agree to let us in?

Do we want to go into the jury room if they agree when in fact I'm not so worried about their behavior being altered as I am an opportunity then to raise all sorts of what will often times be frivolous issues on appeal because we're beginning to dissect people's mental processes?

I think that's wrong. We don't have rules governing how people think, and yet we'll come up with some if we start televising these deliberations.

CARLSON: Now Jeff Toobin, I want to put on the screen, the least true sentence uttered this year so far.

This is from a trial lawyer -- surprise, surprise -- quoted in the Houston Chronicle arguing for cameras. He says, "When you put a spotlight on people, they become more noble, just, fair, compassionate."

And I know that's a lie because I work in television.

And so do you. And in fact when you put a camera on somebody he's apt to become less fair, less compassionate. I mean I could give you the examples. You know them.

TOOBIN: Yes. I am...

CARLSON: Well, there may be others at this table. But the point is you don't want that to happen to jurors, do you?

TOOBIN: The argument that you're making that cameras change behavior is exactly the argument that's been used to try to keep cameras out of courtrooms.

And as Catherine knows at Court TV, they have shown that these cases are generally better, if not the same, with cameras. And it just shows that scrutiny makes people behave better, use better arguments and act more fairly. And I think it's just a false argument that you suddenly are diminished by having a camera on you.

CRIER: Jeffrey just imagine though, if you've got a very tense environment -- [Take] Houston death penalty [trials] ... The jury will feel the pressure of the community if their faces are going out there and if their deliberations are going to be telecast. And you may actually get altered verdicts.

You bet you change the way they behave. When their deliberations are supposed to be private, it should stay private.

TOOBIN: When I was an assistant U.S. attorney we had a rule. If you got a conviction you were never supposed to talk to the jurors afterwards because you could find out something terrible like they convicted the guy because he was black or they flipped a coin.

That was a good way to preserve our convictions. Isn't that a little disturbing? Isn't it disturbing that we don't want to know what goes on in the most important place?

CRIER: No, no, if we want to get rid of the jury system, a jury of our peers where 12 citizens are asked to get together, listen to evidence and make their private deliberations, then let's get rid of it and have a judge do it on the record. They write the brief, we can analyze it until kingdom come.

That's not the jury system. If, in fact, there is one aberration here or one aberration there and a problem, we try to ferret them out. But let's not reason to destroy the entire jury system. Cameras in the courtroom will change what we have had for centuries and what the people of this country seem to think is a valuable service in the criminal justice system.

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