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Unanimous decision Senate committee approves Earnhardt autopsy photo bill
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) -- The public would need a judge's approval to see autopsy photos under a bill approved Tuesday by a Senate committee, a measure sought by Dale Earnhardt's widow in an attempt to block a newspaper's effort to see pictures of the NASCAR driver's autopsy. The bill won unanimous approval from the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, its first step to becoming a law. Senators rejected the bulk of a proposed compromise that would have allowed anyone to see autopsy photos, but required a judge's permission to make copies of them. Florida has some of the nation's strongest open government and public records laws, but a judge has temporarily blocked The Orlando Sentinel's request to have an independent authority look at the photos. The newspaper's request has outraged NASCAR fans and others who have deluged public officials and the newspaper with objections. The Sentinel said it doesn't plan to publish the photos, but wants an outside expert to examine them as it looks into NASCAR safety. Earnhardt was killed in a crash Feb. 18 at the Daytona 500. His wife Teresa sued Volusia County four days later to stop release of the medical examiner's photos.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Jim King, R-Jacksonville, whose district includes Daytona International Speedway, would require a person to show good cause to a judge before being allowed to see the photos. "This is different from most open records," King told the committee. "This open record has the potential of hurting a family." The bill (CS SB 1356) still needs approval from the Senate Government Oversight and Productivity Committee before it can come to the full Senate for a vote. A House companion bill (HB 1083) hasn't had a hearing yet. King's bill would make it a third-degree felony to release the records with a maximum sentence of five years in jail and a $5,000 fine. Bill supporters rebuffed attempts to lessen the penalty for violators to a misdemeanor. "We think this bill has a tremendous inroad for anybody to make a request from a judge to see photos," King, the number three Republican in the GOP-dominated Senate, said after the hearing. King said he thought a judge might rule that there is a legitimate purpose for letting the Sentinel's expert examine the photos. "But by this legislation I've cut out the rotten.coms and the ghoul.com Web sites from getting the photos," King said. The compromise measure may return as the bill moves through the process, said Sen. Locke Burt, R-Ormond Beach, its chief proponent. Under existing law, the photos are a public record -- but a judge has blocked their release until a ruling on the widow's request, scheduled for a hearing March 19. Gov. Jeb Bush supports the idea of keeping the Earnhardt photos from becoming public. "I'm hopeful there will be a compromise to balance out the rights to privacy in these kinds of moments for famous people and not so famous people [with] the right for the public to be aware of these things," Bush said. Burt said his ultimate goal was to prevent families from having pictures of their deceased loved ones from being publicly distributed. He said he was troubled by the freedom of the press questions raised by advocates for newspapers, who told the committee that the public needs to have oversight over government agencies, including medical examiners. Thom Rumberger, a lawyer for Teresa Earnhardt, said "you can walk all over this state and lift up every rock and you will never find a First Amendment right" to have access to such photos. He said there is a market for the photos in the world of Internet publishing, and even if the Sentinel doesn't publish them, someone is likely to figure out a way to get them into the public realm. "What they are saying on the Internet is ... 'If we can just get a hold of the Earnhardt pictures, we'll make a fortune,'" Rumberger said. Representatives of newspapers also argued that if reporters have to go to court every time they want to look at photos, they will unnecessarily involve grieving families, when they may not end up wanting the photos anyway. King said whatever the Legislature does, the issue may end up being decided by the state Supreme Court or even the U.S. Supreme Court.
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