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	Ex-Priest McCormack Fails in Bid to Seal Records in Commitment Battle Chicago Breaking News November 4, 2009 http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009/11/ex-priest-mccormack-fails-to-seal-records-in-commitment-battle.html A judge today denied a request from a convicted former priest to seal records and keep private most of the court proceedings on whether he should be committed under a state statute for sex offenders. Under the Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act, the Illinois attorney general and the Cook County state's attorney filed a joint petition in September to have Daniel McCormack confined to a state treatment facility. The law allows prosecutors to seek continued incarceration if a psychological exam leads them to believe another sex crime is likely if the inmate goes free. McCormack, 41, pleaded guilty in July 2007 to abusing five boys and was sentenced to five years in prison. He was removed from the priesthood in 2007 by Vatican decree. In September, a forensic psychiatrist diagnosed McCormack with pedophilia and recommended civil commitment. Citing details in that publicized report, defense attorney Daniel Coyne, a professor at Chicago-Kent College of Law, asked Judge Dennis Porter to seal records going forward and hear testimony about McCormack's mental health behind closed doors. Prosecutors objected to the motion, as did the Chicago Tribune. "Continued dissemination of the respondent's past crimes, current mental state, mental health history and psychiatric diagnosis to the Cook County jury pool will pose a serious and imminent threat to the fairness of the commitment proceedings," the motion said. Porter denied the request and set another hearing in the case for Nov. 19.
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