This editorial represents the consensus opinion of the editorial board of the Daily Herald.
There has been a welcome trend in recent years to allow cameras in courtrooms. It is slowly but surely spreading in Cook, Kane, McHenry, Lake, DuPage and Will counties.
The state Supreme Court gave circuit judges leeway to experiment by allowing information operations to select pool photographers to discreetly photograph court proceedings. The media interested in covering a case make a request, the lawyers intervene and it is then up to the judge to decide.
This kind of openness was refreshing. Photography provided a window into the justice system in a way that courtroom sketches could not.
And that’s what makes what’s going on in Will County so curious.
Reporters from our newspaper and other outlets have been covering preliminary hearings in a 50-year-old murder case since the arrest of 77-year-old Barry L. Whelpley at his north Minneapolis home in 2021.
He is accused of raping and killing 15-year-old Julie Ann Hanson in Naperville. She disappeared while riding her bicycle to her brother’s baseball game. His body was discovered a day later. She had been sexually assaulted and stabbed 36 times.
Our reporters have filed a request for access to Naperville police reports on the case under the Freedom of Information Act.
This is standard procedure for the news media, and it would have been SOP for the Naperville Police Department to at least release redacted reports — as it was prepared to do.
But Will County Assistant District Attorney Chris Koch asked Judge David Carlson to halt the publication of those reports for fear that pretrial publicity would jeopardize Whelpley’s right to a fair trial. Whelpley’s attorney, Terry Ekl, agreed. The judge then ordered the Naperville police not to release the reports.
It comes from the county that tried household name Drew Peterson, whose history was more recent and attracted a media circus.
The Whelpley case has ethical implications far beyond solving the crime of Julie Ann Hanson’s murder. Police worked with a genealogy company to find a match from a DNA sample taken from his body. He found potential matches with Whelpley and his deceased brother and father.
Will County courts are not seeing their cases appealed due to pre-trial publicity. Why is this case so worrying?
Withholding information this way is a slippery slope. Who can say that it will not become a habit?
Why is this case treated differently than other murder cases?
It shouldn’t be.
