Tennessee Supreme Court visits campus to debate high-profile case
Stephanie Schiraldi |
The SCALES project traditionally brings the Tennessee Supreme Court to the Lipscomb campus once a year
The Tennessee Supreme Court visited Lipscomb University last week to hold an official session on campus, including debate of a much-publicized public records law case between Nashville's daily newspaper, The Tennessean, and Nashville Metro Government.
The court traditionally holds one official session each year on the Lipscomb campus as part of the American Legion Auxiliary Volunteer Girls State program, a leadership and citizenship-training program offered to rising high school senior girls in Tennessee, held annually on the Lipscomb campus.
The Tennessee Supreme Court visits Girls State for a day to debate two real cases for the girls to watch and learn from as part of their Supreme Court Advancing Legal Education for Students (SCALES) project. The SCALES project was formed to educate young people about the judicial branch and provide them with a firsthand look at the Supreme Court in action.
This year brought a potentially historic case involving the Public Record Acts to the stage of Collins Alumni Auditorium.
The case under discussion was brought against Nashville Metropolitan Government by The Tennessean when a reporter was denied access to information collected as part of an ongoing investigation into a high-profile rape case at Vanderbilt University. The Tennessean requested access to surveillance videos and third-party text messages between Vanderbilt coaches and the football players who were accused in the rape, information the newspaper considers public records. The request sparked a debate on public records law and the privacy right of crime victims.
The Tennessean was joined in their fight by a coalition of local TV stations as well as the Chattanooga Times Free Press, Tennessee Coalition for Open Government, The Associated Press and several others.
The hundreds of Girls State participants listening to the debate were joined by a crowd which included, according to The Tennessean, the Nashville District Attorney Glenn Funk, former Nashville District Attorney Torry Johnson, every editor on The Tennessean staff, past editors and other media advocates.
At the end of The Tennessean case debate, the Girls State participants were able to ask the lawyers questions ranging from why they wanted to be attorneys to whether their approach in the records case would have been different if the rape victim was a minor.
The girls also had the opportunity to listen to another case dealing with a mother appealing termination of her parental rights.