- Utah County Attorney's Office and media attorneys support cameras in court to counter misinformation.
- Prosecutors argue public access helps counter conspiracy theories in Tyler Robinson murder case.
- Robinson's defense claims media coverage threatens fair trial rights; hearings set for April.
PROVO — The Utah County Attorney's Office says, as Tyler Robinson and his defense team does, the publicity surrounding the capital murder case has created concerns for their office.
"A number of conspiracy theories about this murder have circulated worldwide," the prosecution notes in its latest court filing.
But unlike the defense team, prosecutors say that's exactly why cameras and microphones should remain in the courtroom.
"Keeping court proceedings as public as possible helps to quell and contradict the tide of misinformation," the state's latest court filing says.
Both prosecutors and attorneys for the media filed oppositions on Friday to Robinson's efforts to keep cameras and microphones out of his court proceedings, while also opposing efforts by Robinson to classify his defense team's arguments as "private."
"Put simply, the defense wants to deny the public access to public information, including publicly created information. The defense cites no authority for this novel argument. Nor could it. What is public is public, and the defense cannot make public information secret by putting it in a court filing — especially where the presumption is that court filings are public," attorneys for the media argue in their filing.
Robinson, 22, is charged with capital murder and faces a potential death sentence if convicted of killing Charlie Kirk, 31, on Sept. 10, 2025, on the campus of Utah Valley University. His defense contends that electronic media coverage threatens Robinson's due process and his rights to a fair and impartial trial.
He has court hearings scheduled for Friday, March 13, and April 17 to present arguments to keep cameras out of his court hearings as well as other various motions for privatizing other court documents.
"As the news media has briefed at length, courts have for decades successfully protected fair trial rights by addressing potential juror bias through targeted measures like voir dire," attorneys for the media said. "These targeted measures are far more effective than broad closure orders that deny access to public information and, if anything, lead to more speculation and outrage."
Prosecutors further noted that Robinson "incorrectly presumes that pretrial publicity will prejudice his right to a fair trial. As the United States Supreme Court has held, 'pretrial publicity, even if pervasive and concentrated, cannot be regarded as leading automatically and in every kind of criminal case to an unfair trial.' On the contrary, courts have well-established processes for assessing and mitigating the effect of pretrial publicity on potential jurors."
