Editor’s Note: Scanned documents and audio files of the court hearings are at the bottom of the article In the background of the racial equality protests and white supremacy counter protests taking place in Downtown Portland and throughout the rest of the country and world are other stories that normally would seem mundane and unrelated. […]
While we may never know how many people called in and joined the WebEx meeting for a remote hearing on a case that normally would have drawn little attention, the amount of chatter it generated on Twitter afterwards suggests that it well could have been a packed courtroom in non-pandemic days.
Last night I wrote about the arraignment of retired Portland Police officer Scott Groshong, one of the rare instances where it seems that a police officer in Portland could face actual consequences for actions that occurred while on duty. I just received the audio recordings of his arraignment hearing earlier today, and while I hadn’t really thought about it before now, I’m both surprised and not surprised at the level of privilege that a retired cop is given in the courts.
I’ve already announced through Twitter/Mastodon, but I have obtained the audio transcript for the release hearing from Monday for Alan Swinney, where his release was denied. As these are public records, I’m making them available to the general public, in the original ‘For The Record’ player format as well as an MP3 that does not require any special tools.