ACLU Decries Ban on TV at Olson Trial

The American Civil Liberties Union on Tuesday criticized as “shortsighted” a Superior Court judge’s decision to bar television cameras from his courtroom during the bomb plot trial of former fugitive Sara Jane Olson.

First Amendment attorney Douglas Mirell, a board member of the ACLU’s Southern California chapter, said Judge James M. Ideman’s decision denied Olson the chance to “clear her name and vindicate herself before the world.”

Olson is accused of conspiring to kill police officers by helping to plant pipe bombs under two patrol cars in August 1975. During 23 years on the run from the charges, she built a respectable life as a doctor’s wife and mother of three who is active in her church, community theater and volunteer groups.

Prosecutors have identified Olson, then known as Kathleen Soliah, as an enthusiastic member of the Symbionese Liberation Army who schemed to kill police officers to avenge the deaths of six SLA members killed in a 1974 standoff with police in South Los Angeles.

Court TV and CNN had sought to carry live coverage of the trial, and Olson’s defense team joined in. But the district attorney’s office objected, citing security issues and ongoing investigations.

In barring cameras, Ideman admitted a bias he said is held by most of his fellow judges, especially after the O.J. Simpson murder trial. “We were burned,” Ideman said.

The judge also sought to spare prosecution witness Patricia Hearst Shaw the pain of reliving on live TV her SLA kidnapping, which includes claims of rape and torture.

Mirell noted, however, that Hearst has written a book about the case, given magazine and television interviews about it, and appeared in several feature films.