Tape or Type? Court reporters fear for jobsAuthor(s): Lynne ReavesSource: ABA Journal, Vol. 70, No. 1 (January, 1984), p. 29Published by: American Bar AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20756876 .

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medical evidence showed it three centime

ters under the skin and indicated a general anesthetic would be required, the federal courts blocked the removal.

Garrett says the Lee case is much dif ferent from other Fourth Amendment cases in which courts prohibited removal of bullets. "In those cases we were talking

about bullets lodged in spinal columns or behind a rib. In this case, all of the doc tors say, Tt's a piece of cake.'"

Because of all the haggling over the bul

let, Winston is worried that his client is

being denied a speedy trial. "I have been

objecting to these continuances all along, but so far I haven't had any success. Lee

is still in jail. He can't make bond." ?Lynne Reaves

immediately in the number of court

reporters. He said most judges who replace the reporters will do so through attrition.

Marshall Jorpeland, communications

director for the National Shorthand Reporters Association, says many report ers are nevertheless anxious about their

future. "The fear is there," he said. "I

don't know how well based it is, however.

We don't expect a big shift. This is a very unsettled issue."

Spaniol and his staff have spent the last several months preparing guidelines for

judges who wish to opt for the machine. "The guidelines will specify when a judge will be eligible to have the equipment installed," he says. The cost of the equipment is about

$10,000 per courtroom. The systems will most likely be four-channel recording devices which include four microphones. Three channels will be linked to individual

microphones, while the fourth will record the entire proceeding.

The study concluded that if the equip ment is properly managed, it can provide a

complete and timely record and do it less

expensively than a court reporter, Spaniol

says. The tape recordings would still have to be transcribed onto paper.

Jorpeland argues that the tape recorder

is behind the times when compared with the new computer transcription devices

many court reporters are using. "We don't

see where a court system will advance

itself with the use of tape recorders," he said. "It is a limited technology. We don't

feel there will be a cost savings." District Judge John Singleton of

Houston, who served on the Judicial Con

ference until recently, also is concerned

about the economics of the switch. "The

equipment will still require that there be an operator in the courtroom. Since you

still have to have a person there, I can't

see a saving."

Singleton doesn't plan to "utilize my

option at this time. The problem that wor

ries me is with the accuracy in transcrip tions."

In the District Court in Chicago, Judge Frank McGarr said, "There is a great reserve of doubt out there about the use of

tape recorders. I don't expect any great

changes in this court. We all have court

reporters now and many of them have

been with us for some time. We have con

fidence in them." ?Lynne Reaves

Using Recorders The Alaska experience

Court reporting is a dying art, says Art Snowden, administrative director of the Alaska state court system.

Snowden oversees the only state court system in the United States that uses recording devices to the exclusion of court report ers. When Alaskans attained

statehood in 1959, they chose the

recording devices for a simple rea son, Snowden says. "There

weren't many people in Alaska then, much less many court

reporters."

Representatives of the Alaska courts testified concerning their

experiences before the Judicial Conference of the United States, which later approved the optional use of tape recorders in federal courtrooms.

Snowden is a strong advocate of the use of the electronic record ings. "It is less expensive and probably more reliable than the human reporter," he says. "We

have been successful because we have constructed and designed our courtrooms for tape recorders.

Courtrooms have to be sound

proofed for the system to work correctly."

The Alaskan courts are awaiting new, more sophisticated recording devices, Snowden says. "The

equipment we have now is proba bly the most antiquated in the country. But the legislature has approved $1.2 million for new

equipment."

Despite the growing use of com

puterized transcriptions by court reporters, Snowden still prefers the use of the machine. "With the computerized transcription you still get the reporter's bias in the court. Court reporting is a dying field." ?L.R.

LawScope continued on p. 32.

January 1984 Volume 70 29

Tape or Type? Court reporters fear for jobs

The option to replace man with machine becomes available to the federal

courts this month, and court reporters are

worried about their future.

Last September the Judicial Conference of the United States, the policy making arm of the federal judiciary, approved the controversial use of electronic recording

equipment. The decision came after a

yearlong study and despite substantial lob

bying by court reporters. Economics is the main reason the con

ference gave for providing the choice?an

option already available in several state

courts.

In a report issued by the Federal Judi cial Center last July, the cost of operating the recording system annually was pro

jected at $18,604. That compares with an annual $40,514 for the corresponding offi cial stenographic court reporter system.

"Projecting those costs over six years,

the average cost of an audio-based court

reporting system is about $125,000 com

pared to $275,000 for the official court

reporting system," the study concluded.

"It is too early to predict the number of federal courts that will use tape record

ings," said Joseph Spaniol, deputy direc tor of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts. "The situation is

very different in each court."

Spaniol predicted no large reductions

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