October 20, 2009 Special Issue

Get out of jail free

A reporter shares his story on potentially prejudicing a jury

by Tristin Hopper

Tristin Hopper holds up a copy of the Whitehorse Daily Star, which called him out for publishing inadmissable evidence

The courtroom was supposed to be where I watched other people get in trouble. A murderer, in this case. Four years ago, Karen Rodrigue stabbed her 64-year-old friend with a kitchen knife, covered his body with a sheet, pawned his chainsaw collection and then went on an eight-day cocaine binge.

It was an accident, she said.

I was there as the Yukon News reporter sent to cover her retrial. She’d already been proven guilty once and now she was seeing if she could get a fresh verdict.

That morning, fresh from four hours of sleep and two pots of coffee for breakfast, I was expecting yet another long day of forensic experts describing the wonders of blood pooling analysis via video-conference.

Instead, the stern-faced Supreme Court justice held up a copy of my newspaper before the courtroom and said that he had been “disturbed” by something he’d read over the weekend.

The deal was this. I had printed “inadmissible evidence” about the trial, which was against the law, for starters, and punishable by up to two years in prison.

And, if any member of the jury had read my article and seen the “inadmissible evidence,” the trial would have to be scrapped—a mistrial, if you will—and redone with a new jury. My newspaper would have gotten stuck with the million-dollar tab.

“This trial is already four years old. [...] A mistrial would result in further anguish for the family [...] and further expense for the public,” said Justice John Vertes.

Anguished relatives had actually become a welcome sideshow to this particular murder trial (“The family gasped as the RCMP officer described his first encounter with the week-old body”). Now, however, their anguish turned into steadied, me-focused rage.
Needless to say, I didn’t even know I had broken the law. It was like finding out that Twinkie possession was illegal.

As for the offending newspaper story, though, I had missed the first day of the murder trial, unlike every other media outlet in town. As the trial’s gritty details were broadcast over the radio and in the pages of our newspaper’s rival, I quickly realized I had missed the boat. So, with only a few hours to go before deadline, I cobbled together a beautifully written “recap” of the first trial using old copies of our paper. The story included the jury’s original decision (“Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!”) and why they had come to that decision.

If a jury member from the current trial had gone home and immediately clawed open the day’s paper searching for fodder that could sway their opinion against Karen Rodrigue, I would have been complicit in their indiscretion.

One by one, the jury members were trotted out of the room and asked if that was what they had done. I sweated to a cartoonish degree. To this day, my tweed court-going jacket still carries the funk of stress.

Luckily for me, the jury had spent their weekend far from any copy of the Yukon News. The trial—and I—were spared.

“Judge Rebukes Reporter,” blared the front-page headline of our hated rival, the Whitehorse Daily Star. Confusingly, the headline was run atop a picture of a puppy in a ski harness.

“We’ll be reviewing this turn of events,” my editor commented to a Whitehorse Star reporter.

Faced with two criminal violations and the possible jeopardization of a multi-million dollar murder trial, my editor and I did the only thing we could think of: we wrote a letter saying we were really sorry and we wouldn’t do it again.

Strangely, it worked.

Being located in the Canadian north turned out to be our saving grace. Assault, drunk driving, cocaine use and forcible confinement are routine activities in the north; the premier himself, Dennis Fentie, is a convicted heroin dealer. The same is true for journalistic violations, apparently.

This happens “all the time,” Justice Vertes told me while I fervently apologized in the judge’s chambers. Rural newspapers are frequently staffed with inexperienced, hung-over reporters; perjurous indiscretions were common.

“Maybe we should hold a workshop or something,” he said.

A month later, an official-looking letter arrived at the Yukon News from the office of the Canadian Minister of Justice.

It stated that we could all be charged with “almost-prejudicing-a-jury” (not the real term) and there was not much we could do to defend ourselves. But, as long as we didn’t do it again, they weren’t going to bother.

In my opinion, the law is part of the problem.
Originally penned in the days of printing presses and typewriters, the law seems to have little
relevance in the digital age. Theoretically, any one of the jurors could have found out whatever I printed after only a few Google searches.

Nevertheless, the event’s lessons were not lost on me. The pen definitely is mightier than the web, so much so that my pen almost had me sharing a cell with Karen Rodrigue (the jury found her guilty again, by the way).

The Yukon News now keeps a lawyer on speed dial and the paper’s editors go at court stories with a particularly fine-toothed comb.

Still, later that month, I printed details from a court decision document about a domestic assault, failing to notice the red “PUBLICATION BAN” stamp on the front. The courts didn’t notice, but legions of irate Yukon citizens did.

I finally decided to throw in the towel on the whole court reporting beat and go back to my position as the city council lackey.

City of Whitehorse zoning discussions didn’t have nearly as much death and violence, but it was much easier for me to stay out of jail.