Court proceedings that may have been tough to get to before the pandemic are now accessible online through a system called Webex, which has reshaped public access. 

For reporters and the public, access to court proceedings in the Webex era has been a mixed bag, as varied as the judges who run them. But overall Webex is seen as a positive development. Many in the Colorado justice system want online courtrooms to remain post-COVID, including the chief justice of the Colorado Supreme Court.

In an interview, Brian Boatright told The Denver Gazette that despite glitches early on, virtual law is here to stay.

“The pandemic has taught us that oral arguments can be efficient and effective when done virtually. I expect that attorneys who previously had to travel significant distances to present their arguments will want to take advantage of that option,” said Boatright.

Still, Webex doesn’t solve access problems if judges decide not to allow it. In March, not many people will see what happens when a former Kiowa County sheriff’s deputy goes on trial in connection with the controversial killing of a beloved local handyman because 15th Judicial District Judge Mike Davidson has opted not to allow people to watch on Webex. Quinten Stump is facing three felony charges including two counts of attempted second-degree murder and one count of assault with a deadly weapon in the death of Zach Gifford. The 39-year-old was shot in the back while he was running away during a traffic stop

Stump’s trial will be in Eads, a tiny town near the Kansas border that is a three and a half hour drive from Denver and two and a half hours from Colorado Springs — too far for news outlets with limited resources to assign a reporter to cover it from beginning to end.

Eads’ local newspaper, The Kiowa County Independent, will likely be the only eyes and ears for the public.

“It makes sense to stream it on Webex for taxpayers who are interested. It’s about transparency,” said Kiowa Independent reporter Betsy Barnett, whose office is across the alley from the Kiowa County Courthouse. She will split time with an assistant to cover the trial.

Ray Satter, a former Denver County Court judge, said Davidson’s decision not to make the trial available online is silly. “He could be barring people from being in his courtroom,” said Satter.

Even though Webex makes him feel like a talk show host, Satter said he likes it for routine cases like DUIs and landlord disputes. As a traveling senior judge, the Webex option means fewer long and sometimes dangerous drives across the state for hearings.

“It’s really slick,” he said of Webex, but added that sometimes people ruin the experience, like the time a defendant took his cellphone to the bathroom during a hearing and didn’t turn it off. Or the guy accused of driving without a license who attended the Webex while driving his car.

Webex has been shown to work well in high profile cases. The murder trials of Mark Redwine in La Plata County and STEM school shooter Devon Erickson in Douglas County were broadcast without a hitch.

Retired Denver County Court Judge Gary Jackson told The Denver Gazette that staying on top of virtual hearings first presented a challenge for him, but it was not impossible.

“I would have a protest case where a protester would call in wearing a clown suit. Or they’d give you the finger. I’ve seen inappropriate objects on the walls,” Jackson said.

When those kinds of events happened, Jackson relied on his court clerk to exclude the offensive Webex participant.

That’s great for judges who have the staff to help, but sometimes judges in rural areas are short-staffed and don’t always have a tech-savvy clerk to solve problems that come up during hearings and require quick decisions.

Carolyn Tyler, spokeswoman for the 2nd Judicial District in Denver, said Webex has been effective for alleged victims who don’t want to face their offenders in the courtroom.

In Chaffee County, 15th Judicial District Judge Ramsey Lama on Monday mentioned problems with the live Webex courtroom video stream for his change of venue order in the high profile murder trial of Barry Morphew.

Lama decided to move the trial to Fremont County from the 24-seat Salida courthouse. In his order, Lama noted the problems the court had early in the case when 1,100 people listened into the Webex feed simultaneously. The crowded livestream made the Webex chat rooms impossible to control. In response to that episode, Judge Patrick Murphy, who oversaw the case until recently, banned recordings and rebroadcasts of any Morphew proceedings.

Listening in on the case got even more restrictive last month when it appeared the Webex had been hacked. Lama reacted by removing live reporting courtroom privileges from journalists covering the case.

Colorado First Amendment attorney Steve Zansberg says this comes down two simple words: open court. He believes it’s the judges’ job to figure out the technology so that the public can keep up with court proceedings.

“This is just an ‘off’ button that you push. Courtrooms have to be open,” said Zansberg.

He has seen the evolution of courts pre- and post-Webex. “I remember when judges wouldn’t let you read the newspaper in court. When cellphones first came in, you couldn’t use those,” said Zansberg.

“Virtual court proceedings have made the judicial process more transparent because they allow journalists to cover trials and allows the public to gain access,” said Jeff Roberts, executive director of the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition. “It’s been good for the poor reporters who have multiple stories to cover, trying to do their jobs to inform the public.”

Roberts adds that since the COVID-19 pandemic began, public accounts have increased at the Colorado Supreme Court Library, where users have been able to get free access to civil court records to search cases and download the documents as PDFs. According to an email from Supreme Court law librarian Chris Hudson, that perk will continue post-pandemic, even though the library has reopened to the public.

Zansberg says people are intimidated by the court system, so he teaches them their rights early on. “I take students on field trips to trials and they’re stunned when they realize courtrooms are open to the public. They say, ‘You mean we can just walk in?’”