So in light of all the hub bub over the release of files and the legality of what people should or should not know about legal cases in the US there is a case that involves Damian Lillard that in my opinion should or could lead to national relevance. This is a story out today in the Oregonian. It talks about the files being sealed for Lillards divorce. Think Big Picture here. The Oregonian/OregonLive A Clackamas County judge unsealed Portland Trail Blazer Damian Lillard's divorce case last week. Dear reader, Regular readers of this column know that while it’s a journalist’s job to report and publish the news, much of their time also is spent pushing for access to public records and meetings and, sometimes, courthouses and case files. Often, those latter tasks drag on and on. But here’s a whoop and a holler for one that went quickly – for the justice system, that is. You may recall that my predecessor, Therese Bottomly, wrote in June about how Portland Trail Blazer Damian Lillard and his ex-wife, Kay’La Hanson, had filed for divorce in 2023. While divorce filings are supposed to be public, a Clackamas County judge had agreed to seal the case, which blocks it entirely from public view. The judge, one of several in Clackamas County who have handled parts of the case, even agreed to put the order that sealed the case under wraps as well. After Bottomly began asking questions, the hundred or so records that had already been filed in the case disappeared from the online database that reporters and others use to track court proceedings. It was highly unusual – and appeared to be a concession made only to those who have the resources to hire a high-powered attorney who knows how to argue for evading open courts requirements. Over the past five years, only a handful of other divorce cases in the state were similarly made secret. It also flew in the face of the Oregon Constitution, which requires “no court shall be secret, but justice shall be administered, openly and without purchase.” Bottomly’s column piqued the interest of Jim Hargreaves, a retired Lane County judge who shared her concerns about the creation of secret court systems for the wealthy. As The Oregonian/OregonLive reporter Zane Sparling shared last Monday, Hargreaves challenged the move to seal the records. It’s not that he cares so much about seeing the details of the high-profile dissolution, he told Clackamas County’s Presiding Judge Michael Wetzel. (Wetzel was not the judge who issued the original order to seal the case). “I want my right under statute to look at the case file,” he said. “We don’t do secret litigation in this country.” That’s why it matters to journalists, too. When we take on these fights for access to records and meetings, we do so in the name of the public. Average citizens rarely have the time or resources for these challenges that often require some expertise, diligence and a lot of patience. It was interesting to read Lillard’s attorney’s response to Hargreaves’ filing. “Mr. Hargreaves has no stake in this divorce proceeding,” wrote Joseph M. Levy, an attorney with Markowitz Herbold. “He is not related to any of the parties, nor even friends with any of the parties. In fact, to the best of their knowledge, he has never met the parties or their children. “His reasons for prying into the parties’ sensitive divorce are a complete mystery.” No, not a mystery. Put simply, this is about Oregonians’ right to a fair and open judicial system. And Wetzel agreed. The judge overturned the blanket ban that sealed the case. He acknowledged the sensitivity around court documents that may reference the former couple’s three children and gave lawyers 60 days to identify wording around them or financial matters that they’d like redacted. This isn’t an arbitrary argument allowing people to pry into others’ personal matters. It’s that we can’t abide a system in which people who can afford can find ways to shield themselves from scrutiny. Such allowances create an opening for others with the means, which not only can lead to secrecy for cases of broad public impact but also erode the justice system’s credibility and the public’s trust. Thanks for reading! Laura Gunderson Editor and Vice President of Content The Oregonian/OregonLive lgunderson@oregonian.com
While I agree that having the means should not give anyone an advantage of having them sealed or not, the real issue is that any divorce proceedings are open to the public in the first place. If it were a criminal case, then yes, I absolutely think they should be unsealed. But IMO, a divorce is a personal matter and no one else's business.
Divorce and other proceedings like this should be confidential. It's fine if the government or perhaps child care authorities or such have a business purpose to view it and for those reasons are granted access. Now I do agree that confidentiality shouldn't only be a benefit for the wealthy. But its ridiculous so much detailed personal information is required to be public. Just another in a long line of reasons its better to live in a state other than Oregon.
Please list the wonderful states that are better to live in because of their fully private divorce records. I'll wait.
So typically Aldo negative. It doesn't have to be really bad. I wouldn't want my financial disclosures on public record, open to anyone who can come up with a lame reason that they want them. So I'm sure a dude who is worth reportedly around $110M wouldn't want his business accessible to the general public or the media. Also, I doubt a guy who has built a brand wants all of the stuff that his ex-wife might have said, even if it was just to increase her position, made public. Imagine all of the information that would be available to local and national media that they could take out of context.
I grew up with this writer and trust me she hated athletes all the way thru HS. Being in the chess club and not being asked out to prom really must have left her scorn! Stay out of people’s biz. Side note: first time saying or typing that word and had to look it up. Now if I could just figure out the whole EFFECT/AFFECT thing!
It looks like the retired judge challenged the documents being kept hidden, not the editor you're saying hated athletes (who, BTW, also was not the writer, whose name also is mentioned in the editorial). This would kind of be like somone blaming Sly for explaining why something Aldo did was allowed
I think I should add some context that might help people understand this. Maybe not like it, but understand it. First, these things are public records for reasons. If you don't want them to be public, one can start a petition to get the law changed for public records for certain civil court actions. In most cases, a divorce happens simply because two people have vague irreconciliable differences. They just don't want to be legally connected anymore. However, emotions run high. A lot of people don't want to admit they've just grown apart for perfectly logical reasons, and there's money involved in these cases, so they say a lot of things that might be technically true but not really true. However, there might also be things that come out of that that might be relevant to the public at large. Did one of the parties strike the other or act in an abusive manner to a child, not in a way that for whatever reason was going to draw a criminal charge but might have been important for people to know? Did someone in one of the parties' circle do that? The person or people being shielded by sealing the documents conceivably could be someone other than either of the parties in the divorce, too. It could even be a member of the bar. For instance, in my criminal matter from last year, I was charged with multiple first-degree misdemeanors for having someone give an old friend what that old friend under oath testified was a sympathy card because their aunt, who also was a friend of mine, had died after a short, unexpected illness. The person that brought the charges worked in the judicial office, and all four judges that presided over various parts of the case were their superiors. By law in my state, all four of them should have disqualified themselves from the case because of multiple conflicts of interest -- the judicial office head even was in contract negotiations with county commissioners on behalf of the complaintant's specific department while my case was happening. Also, the district attorney has more than a professional association with the person that brought the charges. In the affidavit of probable cause and during the preliminary hearing, no mention was made of it being a sympathy card until my lawyer and I asked about it on cross-examination to get it into the record. The DA just put it as a "personalized card," which, one can see, lets your imagination run wild with scandal a lot more than a card that literally said, "I'm sorry about your aunt. She was a nice person." A savvy reporter might look at those records and ask why was this so vague or why was the complaintant's boss overseeing their court case. It's extremely unusual. For obvious reasons, in a case like that, the court might be covering its own backside. Then, back to the Oregonian to close. I worked in journalism for decades, and believe me, U.S. journalism has a whole lot of flaws in it, but this isn't an example of one. News outlets aren't supposed to play favorites. The framers of ths country intended them to be watchdogs on public officials and their assignees. The law in the state of Oregon seems clear. If Dame is given a pass on the law that no one else on this board would have received, what would you think of the elected or appointed officials doing it? What would you think of the Oregonian if it gave Dame and the court a pass and didn't at least look into what is going on for the benefit of the public? The Oregonian might look like it's nitpicking to pursue this -- although, in this case, it actually appears to have been reporting a member of the bar pursuing it -- but the alternative is that the public might conclude that someone has money, power or influence, no one is going to hold them to account. I'm not disputing that doesn't happen, either; I worked for a paper that squelched a story that made a big advertiser look bad. Technically, though, our responsibility should have been to take the financial hit and report the news, which is just what the Oregonian did here. Again, if you don't like the law, then work to change the law, but don't blame the news for reporting the news, and, by all means, if you are going to call someone to account for it, make sure it's the person that's actually doing what you don't like.
