Officially blamed for the termination of a murder retrial, CrimeNet, an Australian Web site that lists criminal records for a fee, will not close -- at least not willingly.
The site's operator Ken Shultz has refused to comply with demands from the Victorian legal establishment. Shultz may be facing contempt of court charges and possible closure in a letter received from the Victorian Director of Public Prosecution and Attorney General Rob Hulls yesterday. The letter demanded he remove all names from the Web site that involve any persons on trial in Victoria.
"It's looking seriously like we're going to be shut down," Shultz told ZDNet Australia.
"I'm constantly looking over my shoulder thinking that I'm going to be served with a writ or seized and thrown in jail on contempt."
CrimeNet came under fire Wednesday after a Victorian judge aborted a murder retrial, citing information released on the Web site had prejudiced the jury.
Shultz has since agreed to amend only the details of persons with overturned convictions or who are facing retrial in the state -- not all Victorians facing trial.
"It would be a lot simpler for the Judge to direct the jury to not access the Web site, the same as they are directed to not watch the news," Shultz said.
Shultz' move may not satisfy authorities, but their legal path is not clear, according to Julie Eisenburg of the NSW Communication Law Centre.
"There are legal hurdles to justify getting the business shut down and free speech implications," Eisenberg said.
Eisenburg believes that the closure of the site won't solve the problem of ensuring fair trials in the future as the Internet becomes more commonplace.
"The more influential and common place the Internet is the harder it is for the courts to keep a handle of what the jurors see," she said.
"Up until now the Australian courts hadn't realised that Internet publications are reaching a large enough pool of people to risk the prejudice. As more people go to the Internet for information courts are going to have to change the way they see a fair trial," she said.
Since the storm broke on Wednesday Shultz has added Terms and Conditions agreement to the site that has to be signed by the user guaranteeing that the user is not a juror. An upfront fee of AU$6 has also been added to the service for accessing information.
According to Shultz there has been high public support for the site, which he claims has received 459,000 visitors from Australia and overseas since yesterday.
