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Jun 19, 2009 6:54 pm US/Eastern
Judge Considers Unsealing Cat Killing Document
CBS4 I-Team Lawyers & The Miami Herald Want Documents Unsealed
Prosecution Says Release Of Documents Would Compromise Case
Prosecutors Say Codefendants Might Exist
MIAMI (CBS4 I-TEAM) ―
The
I-Team was the first to raise questions about the prosecution's case against 18 year-old Tyler Weinman.
Earlier this week,
CBS4 I-Team Investigator Jim Defede reported that their case is based on circumstantial evidence.
The prosecution has been fighting to keep details of evidence used to arrest Weinman secret -- in other words the paperwork called the affidavit supporting Weinman's arrest. This is normally public upon someone's arrest. Weinman's arrest was widely publicized with several county and city leaders speaking out about his arrest on June 14, 2009. But his arrest affidavit remains sealed under court order.
In fact, Florida law makes only rare exceptions for keeping anything involving an arrest affidavit secret.
So why does the prosecution want to withhold it from public inspection?
An attorney representing CBS4 and its news partners The Miami Herald asked those questions in a court hearing Friday in Miami-Dade Circuit Court.
CBS4 I-Team investigator Stephen Stock attended the court hearing and asked for more details about why the state wants normally public documents kept secret.
CBS4 and The Miami Herald asked Judge John Thornton, Jr. to make Tyler Weinman's arrest affidavit public.
CBS4 and its news partners The Miami Herald did so because the public has the right and duty to know why investigators arrested Tyler Weinman.
It's an argument Judge John Thornton, Jr. seemed to lean towards during a hearing Friday. The judge said from the bench that Florida law was clearly on the side of making this information open for public scrutiny.
For a prosecution team coming under increasing scrutiny, the argument to keep normally public documents secret was a significant admission coming from assistant state attorney Michael Von Zamft.
"When you release it, if you do, it's going to need to be redacted and then our investigation will then be dead," Assistant State Attorney Michael Von Zamft told the court in an afternoon hearing.
The case is against 18-year-old Tyler Weinman. Weinman was charged with killing and mutilating 19 cats in the Cutler Bay and Palmetto Bay area during the last several weeks.
"There is a continuing investigation into potential co-defendants that would be compromised," Von Zamft told the court during the hearing.
The assertion by the state attorney's office releasing a normally public arrest affidavit that would by somehow gut or end their case only reignited the critic's claims that police jumped the gun and moved too quickly in arresting Weinman.
"Absolutely," said Weinman's attorney, David Macey. "I think really the focus of this hearing highlights that the state attorney rushed to judgment. (The State Attorney) does not have a complete case."
In fact prosecutors admitted in court that one of the major reasons they want these records kept under seal for at least another three weeks is that other suspects in this cat killings are named in the documents.
"It raises the question of whether this was, in fact, a presumptuous arrest," said criminal defense attorney Jude Faccidomo.
Faccidomo has no interest in this case.
Even so, Faccidomo, with more than 5 years in criminal defense experience, says the fact prosecutors are so zealously fighting the release of a document that almost always is made public, shows the investigation likely moved too fast.
"They (prosecutors) should have no problem opening everything up and saying 'This is what we have,'" Faccidomo said.
Assistant State Attorney Michael Von Zamft bristled at the suggestion that investigators moved too quickly to arrest Tyler Weinman.
"Our investigation goes beyond him," Von Zamft said outside the courtroom after Friday's hearing. "There is the potential that we (investigators), as I said in court, that there were other people working with him."
"In the balance, the presumption must go to the public's right to know," said court analyst Mark Eiglarsh.
Eiglarsh is an attorney based in Hollywood. He has practiced law for 16 years and serves as court analyst for CBS and for CNN. Eiglarsh also serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Miami's School of Law.
Eiglarsh says everyone in the public should be concerned with the precedent that sealing these types of records sets.
"The public has a right to know, Eiglarsh said. "We want to make sure our courts stay open, that we are not having secret tribunals, that people know what's going on."
Judge John Thornton Jr., continued Friday's hearing until next Wednesday at 2:00pm
The judge told the State Attorney that they'd better come up with more compelling witnesses and reason for keeping this arrest document secret any longer.
If the State cannot produce such argument or evidence, Judge Thornton indicated from the bench that he'll release some form of the arrest affidavit, perhaps with parts blacked out. But the Judge seemed ready to release some form of the affidavit as called for under Florida law.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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