Panel Rules in Favor of Neulander Judge

TRENTON, N.J.: A three-judge appeals panel ruled Friday that it was appropriate for a judge to prohibit reporters from contacting jurors in a capital murder case, even after they had been dismissed. The ruling comes as a result of the trial of Fred J. Neulander, a former rabbi accused of arranging the 1994 murder of his wife.

A mistrial was declared Nov. 13 after a jury that had spent more than 40 hours deliberating in the case could not reach a unanimous verdict on any of the three charges against Neulander.

A day after, Superior Court Judge Linda G. Baxter said she would not lift her restrictions on the flock of reporters covering the case. The media had been ordered not to contact jurors or publish their names or likenesses.

While such a ruling is common during a trial, it's unusual after a trial has ended.

The three-judge panel said Baxter took the right course, though it was leaving Philadelphia Newspapers Inc., which challenged Baxter's order, the right to appeal.

The court found "potential for harm inheres in the subtly coercive effect the media's account of prior deliberations would undoubtedly have on the ability of the jury on retrial to be fair."

The judges were also bothered, as Baxter was, that one television station broadcast footage of jurors leaving the courthouse after the mistrial was declared and that The Philadelphia Inquirer published a story that had the name of one juror and comments from another, who was not named.

History showed a "strong likelihood that continued publicity predictably will impair the defendant's right to a fair trial," the panel ruled.

(Copyright 2001 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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Author: 6 - ABC, Action News