Videotaped attack in NYC courtroom raises safety concerns

He will appear from a Brooklyn jail by closed-circuit monitor, a precaution taken after the career criminal slipped a disposable razor blade into a courtroom and attacked a prosecutor in March.

No one was seriously hurt. But the mad scene documented by a profane transcript and by a security videotape widely circulated on the Internet has raised concerns about safety at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, one of the busiest in the country.

It also has given an unexpected measure of fame to a court reporter who leapt into the fray to help two deputies save the prosecutor.

"I was embarrassed when I walked into the cafeteria the next day and everyone started applauding," said Ronald Tolkin, a Vietnam veteran billed on one Web site as the "World's Bravest Stenographer."

In the weeks since, the U.S. Marshals Service has beefed up security with more deputies in courtrooms for appearances by defendants charged with violent crimes or facing long sentences. Defendants also have been seated at attorneys' tables and flanked by deputies during sentencings and other hearings, rather than standing in front of the bench.

Judges generally dislike singling out violent offenders to be restrained, believing "the ability to control the courtroom is really tied to the dignity of the proceeding," said Raymond Dearie, the district's chief judge.

But he said Wright's attack has made the court "rethink how we handle these folks." A committee of judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys and Marshals Service officials has been studying new precautions, Dearie said.

Seeing the video "was sobering, to say the least," he said.

The Marshals Service is irritated that the security video now possible criminal evidence became an Internet sensation of sorts. In a memo distributed earlier this month, the agency said the video had been "inappropriately transmitted out of the USMS by several individuals ... with good intentions regarding the need for awareness, training and prisoner restraints."