After secret court hearings involving a former Scientologist began in Tampa, the St. Petersburg Times and Tampa Tribune filed motions in court to gain access.

Times attorney Patricia Anderson said a larger question remains: Whether the U.S. District Court in Tampa should unseal a case file from a lawsuit that the plaintiff did not want closed. That issue has not been decided.

Margery Wakefield is a former member of the Church of Scientology who sued in 1982, saying the organization fraudulently claimed it would cure her mental illness and instead mentally abused her. She settled her case in 1986 after agreeing not to speak against Scientology anymore. Her case was sealed.