PD Editorial: When sealing court records puts public safety at risk

When the Boston Globe began its Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation into the problem of child sexual abuse by priests in the local archdiocese in 2001, a major obstacle facing the paper’s reporters was accessing information contained in five key lawsuits concerning past abuse. All of the court records had been sealed.

As depicted in the movie “Spotlight,” the sealing of the records proved to be part of a decade-long effort by the church to hide the extent of sexual abuse of children and protect the priests as they were shuffled from one parish to another.

Those stories demonstrate the importance of legislation now working its way through the state Assembly in California that would limit the ability of litigants in civil cases to enter into agreements or obtain court orders that would lock away important information concerning dangers to public health and safety.

AB 889, authored by Assemblyman Mark Stone, D-Scotts Valley, would prevent lawsuits from being settled if the agreements require that information about potential health risks, product defects or other issues relevant to public safety be kept confidential.

The legislation has been approved by the Assembly Judiciary Committee and the Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee and is awaiting a vote on the Assembly floor. Such a vote is needed by the end of the month if it has any hope of moving forward this year. The bill is facing stiff opposition from business groups.

There’s no question that the sealing of courts records can be helpful when it comes to protecting personal privacy in certain circumstances. But it also can draw a curtain over information that could leave individuals, such as children, in jeopardy.

Too often major corporations have used the sealing of such records as a tool to protect themselves from embarrassment or from making costly changes to defective products.

Such was the case in 1996 when consumers began experiencing tread separation failures with Bridgestone/Firestone tires that resulted in high-speed blowouts and other breakdowns.

Knowing that the tires were defective, the company settled more than 200 lawsuits filed as a result of failed tires and had the records sealed. It wasn’t until 2000 when Bridgestone/Firestone recalled 6.5 million Wilderness AT, ATX and ATX II tires in the United States that the full extent of the problem was known. But by then, more than 150 people had died. Eventually the tire defects were linked to 271 deaths and more than 800 injuries.

As noted under the California Public Records Act, the default under California law is that court records should be open to public inspection. But there are exceptions, and AB 889 preserves many of those, which should put business groups worried about protecting trade secrets and those concerned about protecting personal privacy at ease.

For example, the legislation would still allow the protection of medical and personal information as well as any proprietary information that could put a business at a competitive disadvantage if it were disclosed.

It’s no secret why some companies or institutions would want to keep information about flawed practices or products out of the public eye. But that desire for self-protection or even self-preservation should never come at the expense of public safety. At least it shouldn’t from this point on.

The state Legislature should approve AB 889 and send it to the governor for his signature.