The public can no longer observe some court proceedings in Prince George’s County remotely, according to local group Courtwatch PG. Members say courthouses are retaliating against them by reducing access to bail review and other pretrial hearings because of their participation in a lawsuit filed against district and circuit court judges alleging that as many as one-third of those in the county jail are being held illegally.

Founded by formally incarcerated Black women, Courtwatch PG launched in February 2020 to bring transparency to Maryland’s court system. Trained volunteers with the organization have observed bail-related cases and other hearings in PG County District Court and Circuit Court for over a year now.

“All we want is transparency, honesty, and to be able to watch the court like the Constitution says we can,” says Dr. Carmen Johnson, the director of court watch and judicial accountability. “We are not in 1822. We’re in 2022. We should be able to watch court hearings by Zoom.”

One of the trained court watchers is singer-songwriter Fiona Apple, who called attention to the news of reduced access in a video that went viral Monday. “How are we supposed to have our constitutional right to observe these courts or to help these people if we can’t hear?” she said in a video shared by civil rights attorney Scott Hechinger, noting that video access was just revoked about a week after the lawsuit was filed. “And why did they take away this access right after this lawsuit was dropped? It really seems like they’re retaliating against us. And if they’re retaliating against us, I mean, man. What stupid, asshole babies, huh?”

A spokesperson for the Maryland courts, Bradley Tanner, pushed back against the accusations, citing a March 2022 letter from a district and circuit court judges for PG County who warned in-person hearings would resume in the coming weeks. “Any suggestion that this was done in a retaliatory effort for a lawsuit filed in July 2022 is demonstrably false,” Tanner told DCist/WAMU.

Nine people currently or recently detained in PG County jail filed the lawsuit on their own behalf, alleging that they were incarcerated for weeks or even months before their trials, even after judges permitted their release. They believe hundreds more may have been similarly subjected. “A judge has decided that each of these people could safely be released into the community with appropriate conditions,” the complaint says. “Nevertheless, each person remains in jail, in violation of their state and federal constitutional rights, because Prince George’s County District and Circuit Court Judges have abdicated their responsibilities.”

The complaint relies on information gathered by Courtwatch PG volunteers, attorneys representing the nine plaintiffs told the Washington Post. It says that judges unlawfully punted the final determinations on whether they’ll be detained pretrial to the county’s department of corrections, specifically officials within the pretrial division. Plaintiffs and their lawyers say that county corrections officials often reverse a judge’s decision to release an individual without providing any rationale or the opportunity to respond. Even if officials comply with the judge’s decision, delays allegedly prolong the release process, forcing people to stay in jail.

Five of the nine plaintiffs are parents who were separated from their children during their detention, while two lost their homes as a result. One is a teenager who missed school and now risks being held back a grade.

The defendants, which include federal judges and county officials, filed a motion in Maryland District Court to dismiss the preliminary injunction against them, arguing plaintiffs did not suffer injuries-in-fact. The legal filing also says that while two of the nine plaintiffs remain in jail they have “suffered no actual injury because the circumstances of their respective pending criminal matters and criminal histories rendered them ineligible for release.”

“To add insult to injury the state is asking the federal government to dismiss the case as frivolous and not important,” says the group’s executive director, Qiana Johnson.

A hearing on the motion is Tuesday, according to Courtwatch PG. The group plans to join impacted families and legal groups at the District Court in Greenbelt.

The motion to dismiss the filing calls attention to the court watchers’ work, calling them “an army of volunteers, untrained in the law, to watch bond review hearings and make observations and impassioned complaints about them that have little or no legal import.” Courtwatch PG took offense to the characterization, citing their staff’s training, credentials, and their work to raise these issues to federal and PG County officials before the lawsuit.

While Zoom links will no longer be available courthouses made audio available after some back-and-forth. But according to Johnson, it’s unintelligible. Apple compared it to listening to Charlie Brown’s teacher speaking.

The impact of reducing access to remote hearings would be far-reaching, says Dr. Carmen Johnson, because court watchers are scattered across the country and therefore can’t pivot to attending hearings in person. Some have disabilities that preclude them from attending in person. Moreover, families who want to participate in their loved one’s criminal cases but can’t due to work or transportation issues will no longer be able to attend virtually. She adds that law students across the country have also used Court Watch PG as an opportunity to learn more about the criminal justice system.

Apple’s participation in Courtwatch PG helped the group grow from just a few volunteers to having more than 100 from all across the U.S. Apple herself is based in California. She has used her platform to amplify the work of Courtwatch PG, including shouting out their petition to keep virtual court proceedings when she announced she was skipping the 2021 Grammys despite scoring several nominations.

Efforts to keep virtual court proceedings statewide also appear to have hit an impasse. Legislation that would require every court in Maryland to provide remote access to all public court proceedings, except under certain circumstances, stalled in the state legislature this year.

While the Maryland judiciary accepted recommendations that courtrooms across the state should continue to offer audio or video for procedural matters — including bond and bail review hearings and pretrial conferences — discretion is ultimately left to presiding judges. Consequently, access across courthouses is mixed. “There is no uniformity across the state as to which hearings are currently accessible to the public, beyond the participants in a virtual hearing,” according to the Maryland State Bar Association.