EAGLE, Colo., 2 August 2003 — A Colorado judge on Thursday refused to let basketball star Kobe Bryant miss his first court appearance on rape charges and said he would mull over a media request to unseal court documents in the case.

Lawyers for the 24-year-old Los Angeles Lakers’ superstar asked Eagle County Judge Fred Gannett to let him skip the Aug. 6 hearing because he lives out of state. They had also argued that the court could save money on security costs if Bryant stayed home.

But Gannett rejected that request, requiring Bryant to be present when the charges against him are formally read. “He’ll be here,” Bryant’s attorney Hal Haddon said.

Gannett said he hoped to rule before that hearing on a request by the media to unseal affidavits filed in the sensational case, which presumably detail the accusations against Bryant by a 19-year-old hotel concierge.

Authorities have kept a tight lid on the facts of the case and both prosecutors and defense attorneys have asked Gannett to keep the documents sealed.

During a three-hour hearing, attorneys for the media argued that Colorado law called for the release of the affidavits.

“The public has a need to know what the government is up to,” said Christopher Beall, an attorney for the Denver Post, Orange County Register and several other news organizations. “The only way the public can see that is to see the record.”

But Eagle County Deputy District Attorney Gregg Crittenden said the materials should remain sealed so that the woman who made the allegations against Bryant was not “revictimized” by press reports.

Ex-Basketball Hero Rodman Says Doesn’t Recall Alleged Rape

Former US basketball star Dennis Rodman said on Thursday he could not recall ever meeting a woman who has sued him for allegedly spiking her drink with a drug before raping her.

Rodman, 42, was giving evidence in a civil trial brought against him in by a woman who alleged he assaulted her at his home in the Los Angeles area in March 2001.

“I have no recollection of (the woman),” Rodman told a jury at Orange County Superior Court. “That’s two, two-and-a-half years ago.” “I don’t recall having sex with your client,” he told the woman’s lawyer when he asked if the former National Basketball Association bad boy was claiming that he had consensual sex with the woman.