Pittsburgh City Paper, 03/02/21: “Since January, Erica Brusselars has been volunteering for the court watch program of the Abolitionist Law Center, a nonprofit law firm focused on criminal justice reforms. The court watch’s mission is to hold Pittsburgh’s courts accountable through observations and data reporting.

But Brusselars says this has been impossible in one court: courtroom 316 in the Allegheny County Courthouse, where Common Pleas Judge Anthony Mariani presides. Brusselars has requested remote access to Mariani’s courtroom more than 220 times since late January, but has been locked out. She, or anyone at ALC, hasn’t been able to observe courtroom 316 via remote access, despite other courtroom participants using virtual access and other judges granting virtual access to several other ALC court watchers.

‘We requested access to Mariani’s court every day since January 25, and everyone but one, I have been denied, and told that I have to come in person,’ says Brusselars. ‘I am a healthy young person in a pandemic, and I don’t want to go to these courthouses. And there is no reason for me to go. They have the teams and hardware for remote access.’

As a result, Mariani is being sued by ALC as the nonprofit firm “seeks declaratory and injunctive relief to remove that unconstitutional blockade and restore the public’s First Amendment right of access to the courts,” according to the suit filed March 2 in the United States District Court of Western Pennsylvania.

ALC is being represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania and the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at Georgetown University Law Center.

Read the full article here.