Colorado Politics: In a move that potentially tees up the question for the state Supreme Court to resolve, Colorado’s second-highest court on Thursday ruled that judges who exclude members of the public from trial on questionable grounds may have the opportunity to justify their actions on appeal.

The Sixth Amendment guarantees criminal defendants the right to a public trial. Under the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1984 ruling in Waller v. Georgia, trial judges must consider specific factors when deciding whether to close a courtroom to one or more people and, according to the court’s directive, “make findings adequate to support the closure.”

A violation of the right to a public trial triggers automatic reversal of a defendant’s convictions. However, a three-member panel for the Court of Appeals took aim at a question that had never been directly answered in Colorado: If a judge does not make adequate findings during trial, can he get a second chance to do so and head off a potential reversal?

Visit Colorado Politics for more.