Coal Tattoo

Jury selection transcripts not publicly available

This post is from Joel Ebert, who is covering the Don Blankenship trial with Ken Ward Jr.

Today the Gazette-Mail attempted to obtain the transcripts from the day’s jury selection proceedings.

An initial conversation with Lisa Cook, the official court reporter for the Southern District of West Virginia, indicated we would be able to get the official transcripts later this evening – around 8 or 9 p.m.

Cook estimated the costs for the transcripts to be around $260 to $270. If we wanted the transcripts tomorrow morning, she said, the cost would go down to about $200.

We here in the newsroom were discussing paying for the transcripts and then received another phone call from Cook.

This time, Cook said, she had talked to U.S. District Judge Irene Berger about releasing the transcripts. Berger apparently told Cook that because the selection process and the transcripts produced would contain confidential information, the court would not be releasing them.