Hallman v. Reeds et al

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN
SOUTHERN DIVISION
SAMANTHA HALLMAN,
Plaintiff, 	Case No. 2:25-cv-10939
v. 	Hon. Brandy R. McMillion
United States District Judge
HON. TRAVIS REEDS, in his official capacity as
Chief Judge of Michigan’s 52nd District Court;
HON. LISA L. ASADOORIAN, in her official
capacity as a judge of the third division of
Michigan’s 52nd District Court; and HON.
JEFFERY S. MATIS, in his official capacity as
Chief Judge of Michigan’s Sixth Circuit Court,
Defendants.
/
OPINION AND ORDER GRANTING
DEFENDANTS’ MOTION TO DISMISS (ECF NO. 15)
Plaintiff Dr. Samantha Hallman (“Dr. Hallman” or “Plaintiff”) brought this
civil rights action against the Honorable Travis Reeds of Michigan’s 52nd District
Court; the Honorable Lisa L. Asadoorian of the Third Division of Michigan’s 52nd
District Court (“Judge Asadoorian”); and the Honorable Jeffery S. Matis of
Michigan’s 	Sixth 	Circuit 	Court 	(collectively, 	“Defendants”) 	for 	the 	alleged
unconstitutional denial of public access to court records and the right to copy and
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disseminate publicly available court records in violation of the First Amendment and
42 U.S.C. § 1983. See generally ECF No. 1.
Before the Court are Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 15) and
Defendant Judge Asadoorian’s separately filed Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 14).
The Defendants assert that this Action should be dismissed for failure to state a claim
upon which relief can be granted. 	See Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6); ECF Nos. 14, 15.
The Motions have been adequately briefed, so the Court will rule without a hearing.
See ECF Nos. 35, 40; E.D. Mich. L.R. 7.1(f)(2). For the reasons stated below, the
Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 15) is GRANTED and Defendant Judge
Asadoorian’s Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 14) is DENIED AS MOOT. 1
I.
Dr. Hallman is a researcher and lecturer at the University of Michigan’s
School of Education, where she focuses on postsecondary education in prisons and
teaches research methods and statistics. ECF No. 1, PageID.4-5. She holds a PhD
in Psychology and Social Work. 	Id. 	She is also an avid advocate for judicial
transparency and accountability. 	Id. at PageID.22-26. 	For example, she has
requested to view, copy, and/or disseminate recordings of court proceedings from
1 The Court notes that Defendant Judge Asadoorian’s Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 14) moved the Court to dismiss
the Complaint based on absolute immunity. The Court need not reach the merits of whether absolute immunity applies
when Defendants are acting in their judicial capacity because Plaintiff’s Complaint is dismissed in its entirety on other
grounds, as explained herein. Similarly, the Court need not address Defendants’ argument that the Court should
abstain from exercising jurisdiction pursuant to Burford v. Sun Oil, 319 U.S. 315 (1943) and Younger v. Harris, 401
U.S. 37 (1971) because it finds sufficient grounds that this Action is subject to dismissal.
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Michigan state courts, the denial of which she purports is a violation of her
Constitutional rights and has given rise to this Action. Id. at PageID.33-37.
The first time Dr. Hallman requested a recording of a judicial proceeding was
from Michigan’s 52nd District Court (“the District Court”) in 2018, related to her
brother’s possession of marijuana misdemeanor offense to which he pled guilty.
ECF No. 1 at PageID.11. As part of his plea agreement, he was on probation for a
year—a condition of which was to undergo substance abuse counseling. 	Id. 	He
attended counseling as required, but the counselor did not timely provide the
probation officer with proof of his attendance, which resulted in a probation
violation. 	Id. 	Dr. Hallman and her family worked to assist her brother with
obtaining the necessary documents directly from the counselor. 	Id. at PageID.12.
They were unsuccessful in doing so and the counselor contacted the probation
department to report their actions as threats and harassment. 	Id. 	This led to a
probation violation hearing.
On March 9, 2019, Judge Asadoorian presided over the hearing. ECF No. 1
at PageID.12. During the hearing, Judge Asadoorian told Dr. Hallman’s brother to
“shut [his] mouth” on several occasions when he tried explaining the situation to
her. Id. Judge Asadoorian ultimately revoked his deferred plea status, converted the
marijuana possession offense to a permanent conviction, and sentenced him to five
days of community service. 	Id. at PageID.12-13. 	Witnessing her brother’s
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experience in District Court compelled Dr. Hallman to become civically engaged in
judicial elections and judicial accountability. Id.
Some of her advocacy experience includes: participating in a public comment
before the Oakland County Board of Commissioners’ Public Health and Safety
Committee in June 2021; discussing the need for judicial transparency in a May
2022 Detroit Free Press Article; writing an email to the then-Chief Judge of the
Oakland Circuit Court to advocate for changes in the Court’s policies; launching bi-
partisan efforts to state legislators regarding making court recordings public; seeking
the State Bar of Michigan’s support for a state bill put forth in 2023; participating in
a public comment before the State Bar of Michigan’s Board of Commissioners;
conducting and presenting a study on “Democratizing Court-Watching in the Digital
Age: 	Exploring 	Individual 	Court 	Policies 	Regarding Access 	to Audio/Video
Recordings in Michigan;” actively participating in judicial elections for positions in
the district courts, circuit courts, and the Michigan Court of Appeals; and regularly
requesting court recordings from district and circuit courts in Michigan. ECF No. 1
at PageID.22-25.
The State of Michigan does not follow a universal rule for how courts must
treat recordings of court proceedings; so the courts have broad discretion on the rules
and policies they will establish. ECF No. 1, PageID.6-7. 	Under Model LAO 8,
Michigan state district and circuit courts can choose from a variety of policy options
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related to court recordings. Id. at PageID.7. The District Court makes all its audio
or video recordings unavailable to the public. 	Id. at PageID.8-9. 	Meanwhile,
Michigan Sixth Circuit Court’s (“the Circuit Court”) policy allows the public to view
court proceedings, but does not allow copying, disseminating, or sharing those
recordings with other members of the public without permission from a judge, which
is determined based on “extraordinary circumstances.” Id. at PageID.9.
Plaintiff has been subject to both policy options. In April 2022, she requested
a copy of the video and audio recording of her brother’s probation violation hearing
from Judge Asadoorian. See ECF No. 15, PageID.138 (citing ECF No. 1, ¶¶ 36-37).
The District Court Administrator informed her there was no video recording and
denied the request for the audio recording because it was not a public record pursuant
to Local Administrative Order. Id. Plaintiff also on several occasions has requested
video recordings from the Circuit Court, which she was permitted to view at a room
in the Courthouse. ECF No. 15, PageID.138 (citing ECF No. 1, ¶¶ 40, 46, 48).
On April 2, 2025, Plaintiff filed this Complaint alleging her rights to court
access and the ability to disseminate court information to the public had been
hindered. 	See generally ECF No. 1. 	She asserts that the District Court policy
prohibiting access to and copying of court recordings violates the First Amendment;
and the Circuit Court policy which implicitly prohibits copying and dissemination
of recordings available for public viewing is a prior restraint. 	See ECF No. 1,
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PageID.36-37. 	The present motions to dismiss these claims were filed on June 5,
2025. ECF Nos. 14, 15. The Motions have been adequately briefed, see ECF Nos.
14-15, 17-20, and therefore, the Court finds oral argument unnecessary and will rule
on the record before it. See E.D. Mich. L.R. 7.1(f)(2).
II.
In reviewing a 12(b)(6) motion, the Court must “accept all of the complaint’s
factual allegations as true and determine whether these facts sufficiently state a
plausible claim for relief.” Fouts v. Warren City Council, 97 F.4th 459, 464 (6th Cir.
2024) (citing Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555-56 (2007)). 	Facial
plausibility requires a plaintiff to “plead[] factual content that allows the court to
draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct
alleged.” 	Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (citation omitted). 	“The
plausibility of an inference depends on a host of considerations, including common
sense and the strength of competing explanations for the defendant’s conduct.”
16630 Southfield Ltd., P’ship v. Flagstar Bank, F.S.B., 727 F.3d 502, 504 (6th Cir.
2013). The Court is ultimately deciding “whether, as a matter of law, the plaintiff is
entitled to legal relief even if everything alleged in the complaint is true.” Mayer v.
Mylod, 988 F.2d 635, 638 (6th Cir. 1993).
To do so, the Court will generally only look to the four corners of a complaint,
with the exception of “materials attached to a motion to dismiss if they are referred
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to in the complaint and central to the claim.” 	Berry v. United States Dep’t of Lab.,
832 F.3d 627, 637 (6th Cir. 2016). 	The Court is not “constrained to accept
‘[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere
conclusory statements.’” Id. (citing Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009)).
III.
To state a federal claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, “a plaintiff must allege the
violation of a right secured by the Constitution and laws of the United States, and
must show that the alleged deprivation was committed by a person acting under color
of state law.” Edison v. Township of Northville, 752 F. Supp. 3d 808, 819 (E.D. Mich.
2024) (citing West v. Atkins, 487 U.S. 42, 48 (1988)). 	Plaintiff alleges that her
constitutional rights were violated when Defendants denied her (1) access to District
Court recordings of court proceedings and (2) authorization to copy and disseminate
publicly available records pursuant to Circuit Court policy. See generally ECF No.
1. The Court will address each in turn.
A. District Court Denial of Public Access to Court Records
Plaintiff asserts that under the First Amendment, Michigan state courts must
make court proceedings and court records presumptively open and available to the
public. 	ECF No. 1, PageID.33. 	The Court disagrees. 	In Richmond Newspapers,
Inc. v. Virginia, the Supreme Court explained that “in the context of trials[, …] the
First Amendment 	guarantees 	of 	speech 	and 	press, 	standing 	alone, 	prohibit
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government from summarily closing courtroom doors which had long been open to
the public at the time that Amendment was adopted.” 	448 U.S. 555, 576 (1980).
But, 	as 	Plaintiff 	correctly 	points 	out, 	the 	Court 	should 	apply 	the 	two-step
“experience and logic test” from Press-Enterprise Co. v. Superior Ct. of Cal. for
Riverside Cnty., 478 U.S. 1 (1986) (Press-Enterprise II) to determine whether a
qualified First Amendment right of public access attaches to a judicial record. 	See
Courthouse News Serv. v. O’Shaughnessy, 663 F. Supp. 3d 810, 815 (S.D. Ohio
2023), appeal dismissed (June 20, 2023) (internal citations omitted); ECF No. 18,
PageID.247-56.
Under 	the 	Press-Enterprise 	II 	test, 	the 	Court 	assesses 	whether 	“both
experience and logic indicate that a judicial record has in the past, and should in the
future, be afforded public access.” 	Courthouse News, 663 F. Supp. 3d at 815
(emphasis 	added). 	While 	courts 	have 	found 	that 	judicial 	records, 	such 	as
nonconfidential civil complaints, do satisfy the test, the same has not been found for
video or audio recordings such as the ones Plaintiff claims a constitutional right over.
Compare Courthouse News, 663 F. Supp. 3d at 816-17 (“This caselaw and
Courthouse News’ evidence that state and federal courts throughout the nation and
Ohio have traditionally provided access to complaints on receipt, lead the Court to
conclude that complaints have been traditionally accessible to the public and press
[. . .] This Court concludes that public access to complaints plays a significant role
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in the functioning of the judicial process.”); with Stevens v. Boyd, No. 1:18-cv-757,
2021 WL 5364814, at *6 (W.D. Mich. Nov. 16, 2021), aff’d sub nom. Stevens v.
Michigan State Ct. Admin. Off., No. 21-1727, 2022 WL 3500193 (6th Cir. Aug. 18,
2022) (“[W]e have found no case establishing the historical availability of audio
recordings of court proceedings when a party can attend a trial, receive a transcript,
and request the right to record the proceedings themselves. We are not the only court
to come back empty-handed in this regard.”).
Despite citing to Stevens, Plaintiff repeats the same mistake the Sixth Circuit
found in that case—a failure to provide a helpful historical record through which the
Court can evaluate the “experience” prong of the test. Stevens, 2021 WL 5364814,
at *6. 	Instead, Plaintiff provides an extensive historical breakdown underscoring
the context from which the right to access the courts derives. 	ECF No. 18,
PageID.247-51. 	But as Defendants correctly point out, this “is not a case about
access to a trial or hearing,” nor has Plaintiff asserted anything to the contrary. ECF
No. 15, PageID.141. Plaintiff does not allege she has been denied access to attend
court proceedings at the District Court or Circuit Court. Rather, her position is that
history “strongly supports the existence of an evolving […] practice of expecting
courts to make available to the public information that it allows the public to
observe.” ECF No. 18, PageID.250 (emphasis added). In other words, Plaintiff asks
the Court to extend the law such that it should equate “public access” to courts with
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“technologically feasible” accessibility to “what actually happens in courts,” such
as access to recordings of proceedings. 	ECF No. 18, PageID.250. 	The Court
declines to take such a leap just to reach Plaintiff’s desired outcome.
Plaintiff’s argument for the logic prong of Press-Enterprise II similarly fails.
Under this prong, the Court must determine whether “logic demonstrate[s] a First
Amendment right of access to audio recordings when a party already can attend a
trial and receive a transcript of proceedings.” 	Stevens, 2021 WL 5364814, at *5.
Like the experience prong, Plaintiff conflates “public presence at [a] trial” with
access to recordings of those trials or hearings. ECF No. 18, PageID.252 (emphasis
added). According to Plaintiff, this conflation is warranted because “[i]n modern
times, attendance at court during the day is unrealistic for the vast majority of the
public.” ECF No. 1, PageID.34. But mere inconvenience to exercise a constitutional
right is not a ground to challenge state court policies which, at worst, do not alleviate
those inconveniences.
The Court finds that given Plaintiff already “receives multiple forms of access
to a trial,” accessibility to court recordings is more like “a third form of access [that]
does not play ‘a particularly significant positive role in the actual functioning of the
process.’” Stevens, 2021 WL 5364814, at *5 (quoting Press-Enterprise II, 478 U.S.
at 11). 	And the Sixth Circuit has similarly affirmed if any right to copy tapes or
transcripts from Court proceedings exists, “it must come from a source other than
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the Constitution.” 	States v. Beckham, 789 F.2d 401, 409 (6th Cir. 1986) (citing
Nixon, 435 U.S. 589). Thus, while Plaintiff is well within her right to advocate for
more access to recordings of state court proceedings – that is something to be done
with policy makers and not the Courts.2 What the Court can determine, and does
here, is that the current inaccessibility which Plaintiff complains of under the District
Court policy is not unconstitutional. Therefore, Plaintiff fails to state a claim under
the First Amendment upon which relief can be granted.
B. Circuit Court Denial of Copying and Disseminating Publicly Available
Court Records
Plaintiff’s claim that she is entitled to copy and disseminate court records
under the First Amendment fairs no better. Defendants also move to dismiss Count
II of the Complaint based on the lack of a constitutional right to copy video or audio
recordings of court proceedings. See generally, ECF No. 15. Plaintiff responds that
“Defendants have offered no specific arguments as to why this Count should be
dismissed, so their motion should be denied as to Count II.” 	ECF No. 18,
PageID.260. 	The Court finds this argument without merit. 	In fact, Defendants
advance their position with extensive case law, albeit mostly persuasive authority,
to show that the Supreme Court and various federal courts nationwide have rejected
2 The Court notes that it appears Plaintiff has pursued that avenue to change access to court records,
but such efforts have been unsuccessful. 	See ECF No. 15, PageID.142-143. 	Nonetheless, the
Court is not the proper avenue to change public policy.
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a constitutional right to copy recordings. 	See ECF No. 15, PageID.146; see also
Nixon, 435 U.S. 589 at 409. Courts in this District have held the same. See Somberg
v. Cooper, 582 F. Supp. 3d 438, 446 (E.D. Mich. 2022) (“[T]here is no First
Amendment right to record courtroom events.”).
Plaintiff further challenges dismissal by arguing the Circuit Court’s ban on
duplication and dissemination of recordings is an unconstitutional prior restraint.
ECF No. 18, PageID.260-62; see also ECF No. 1, PageID.9-10. To do so, Plaintiff
relies on Soderberg v. Carrion, 999 F.3d 962 (4th Cir. 2021), where the Fourth
Circuit held that in line with the Supreme Court’s decisions in Cox Broadcasting,
420 U.S. 469 (1975), and Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., 443 U.S. 97 (1979),
the trial court must apply strict scrutiny to the Maryland statute at issue. ECF No.
18, PageID.261; see also Soderberg, 999 F.3d at 969.
In Soderberg, however, the Fourth Circuit addressed a broadcast ban related
to “plaintiffs’ copies of the official court recordings of state criminal proceedings [.
. .] that was released to the public in official court records[,]” whereas here, the
Circuit Court does not even permit copying or duplicating court proceedings at the
outset. 	See Soderberg, 999 F.3d at 969; 	see also 	ECF No. 1, PageID.10.
Additionally, the Cox Court held that “[a]t the very least, the First and Fourteenth
Amendments will not allow exposing the press to liability for truthfully publishing
information released to the public in official court records.” 	Cox, 420 U.S. at 496
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(emphasis added). Despite Plaintiff’s attempt to confound copying and publishing
court records, they are distinct, and her case law ultimately concerns the latter.
While the Complaint does deal with the dissemination of recordings, the Court does
not arrive at this analysis because Plaintiff has not provided case law to support any
supposed constitutional right to copy nonpublic recordings. 	In fact, case law she
does cite refrains from directly addressing the issue. See Cox, 420 U.S. at 496 (“We
mean to imply nothing about any constitutional questions which might arise from a
state policy not allowing access by the public and press to various kinds of official
records, such as records of juvenile-court proceedings.”). Finally, any constitutional
right to recordings—which the Court does not recognize—is not absolute. 	See
Nixon, 435 U.S. at 598 (“Every court has supervisory power over its own records
and files, and access has been denied where court files might have become a vehicle
for improper purposes.”). Therefore, the Court finds that Plaintiff has not adequately
shown there is any constitutional right to copy and publicly disseminate court
records, thereby failing to state a claim and warranting dismissal.
IV.
Accordingly, Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 15) is GRANTED
and the Complaint (ECF No. 1) is DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Defendant Judge Asadoorian’s Motion to
Dismiss (ECF No. 14) is DENIED AS MOOT.
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IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dated: October 28, 2025 	/s/ Brandy R. McMillion
Detroit, Michigan 	Hon. Brandy R. McMillion
United States District Judge
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