Opinion
05-22-00480-CR 05-22-00481-CR
08-12-2022
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellant v. SEDRICK JOHNSON, Appellee
On Appeal from the Criminal District Court No. 6 Dallas County, Texas, Trial Court Cause Nos. F19-76129-X & F19-00595-X
ORDER
LANA MYERS, JUSTICE
On August 11, 2022, the entire 229-page clerk's record was filed as a sealed record in 05-22-00481-CR (trial court cause number F19-00595-X). The clerk's record contains the trial court's September 2, 2021 order sealing the "attached Motions and Notices" because the "documents contain sensitive information, including names of complainant and alleged sexual acts." No documents are attached to the order. The remaining documents in the clerk's record, however, were not subject to any sealing order.
Rule 9.10(g) provides:
A court may also order that a document be filed under seal in paper form or electronic form, without redaction. The court may later unseal the document or order the filer to provide a redacted version of the document for the public record. If a court orders material sealed, whether it be sensitive data or other materials, the court's sealing order must be affixed to the outside of the sealed container if the sealed material is filed in paper form, or be the first document that appears if filed in electronic form. Sealed portions of the clerk's and reporter's records should be clearly marked and separated from unsealed portions and tendered as separate records, whether in paper form or electronic form.
Sealed material shall not be available either on the internet or in other form without court order.Tex. R. App. P. 9.10(g) (emphasis added).
Therefore, to the extent any documents were sealed by court order, they must be filed in a separate sealed volume along with a copy of the trial court's order. The remaining documents in the clerk's record were not sealed, and they may not be filed in a sealed clerk's record.
We STRIKE the August 11, 2022 sealed clerk's record in 05-22-00481-CR (trial court cause number F19-00595-X). We ORDER Dallas County District Clerk Felicia Pitre to file proper clerk's records, i.e., an unsealed volume of the clerk's record with all unsealed documents of the case and a sealed volume of the clerk's record with the trial court's sealing order and the sealed documents WITHIN TEN DAYS OF THE DATE OF THIS ORDER.
We DIRECT the Clerk to send copies of this order to the Honorable Jeanine Howard, Presiding Judge, Criminal District Court No. 6; to Felicia Pitre, Dallas County District Clerk; and to counsel for all parties.