News Media and the Law

Barely Transparent

On his first day in office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order and two presidential memoranda that seemed to indicate that he values "transparency" - a government buzzword that, to me, means giving citizens the right to get information that demonstrates what public officials are doing in their name with their tax dollars. [...] by Jan. 22 each federal agency was to post three "high-value data sets."

Tracking Terrorism Trials

Though there have been several iterations of the commissions - Congress passed two laws revising the commissions in the wake of a successful Supreme Court challenge - their use has been so infrequent that legal experts and the media have little idea what to expect. Since Sept. 11, New York University's Center on Law and Security reports that 1 74 suspects have been convicted of terrorism in civilian courtrooms and only three by military commission.

Supreme Court Halts Plan to Broadcast Prop. 8 Trial

"It will start with a tendency to allow cameras in non-divisive, noncontroversial cases," Burke said. [...] nobody may want to watch that, but the change will be incremental. [...] staged re-enactments may be the only form of transparency available to the public.

Citizens United Leaves Many Divided

[...] the court rejected the idea that a media exception to the law can make it constitutionally acceptable.

High Court Hears Enron Executive's Appeal

The reporters convened in Cleveland covered the case so pervasively - they sat inside the bar during jury selection and set up a radio booth next to the deliberations room - that the defendants called it a "Roman holiday" for the news media. According to Skilling, the theme clearly played out during voir dire, the process of questioning potential jurors: nearly nine out of 10 potential jurors who filled out questionnaires said they had heard of Enron's collapse; nearly half said they had som...

Pushing Back On Court Closure

The 7-2 majority opinion in Presley v. Georgia said that Georgia's high court incorrectly upheld a trial judge's decision to bar courtroom observers from viewing jury selection in a criminal trial because both the First and Sixth Amendments guarantee defendants and the public the right to juries selected before the public. The case began when a Georgia state trial court judge ordered defendant Eric Presley's uncle to leave the courtroom while a jury was selected for Presley's cocaine traffic...

Obama's Transparency Efforts Achieve Mixed Results

According to LaFleur's data at press time, 27 of 64 independent agencies had yet to create Web pages. Public records litigation, state secrets leave room for improvement The administration's stance on the state secrets privilege and its approach to public records litigation received more mixed reviews.\n The U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco (9th Cir.) said on Feb. 9 that the lobbyists' identities should be disclosed so long as they are not protected by the presidential communications p...

Secret Justice: Warrants and Wiretaps

The court, citing decisions from another appellate court, rejected the idea "that once wiretap information is used in search warrant affidavits, it is no longer subject to Tide m's restrictions upon its use and disclosure." [...] as with any wiretap materials that are incorporated into court documents subject to a presumption of access, "what is required is a careful balancing of the public's interest in access against the individual's privacy interests."

Courts Say Government E-Mail Can Be 'Private'

"The communication in this dispute was the result of e-mails on a public account, from a public agency, on public time to a litigant coining before the body [Maynard] served . . . that factual scenario should have a very difficult time being exempted from any FOI act," he said. [...] far Crabtree said there has been no immediate move to amend the law in the legislature.

New Office Opens to Mediate Federal Public Records Disputes

[...] last fall, if the federal government denied a public records request, the only recourse to appeal the denial was through the courts. Connecticut's open government office spends a great amount of manpower dealing with anti-openness bills and unnecessary exemptions in the legislature, a phenomenon Murphy says stems from a lack of understanding of the freedom of information laws among lawmakers.

Texas Open Meetings Act Faces Second Legal Challenge

Though prosecutors eventually dropped the criminal charges, a current and former Alpine city council member filed suit against the local district attorney, the Texas attorney general and the state of Texas, arguing that the open meetings law violated their free speech rights under the First Amendment. The next chapter In December, the new group of plaintiffs - the cities of Alpine, Pflugerville, Big Lake and Rockport, plus 1 5 individual elected officials - filed suit in a federal court in P...

Supreme Court Declines to Hear Right-of-Publicity Case

S. Derek Bauer, an attorney for the magazine at the district court and appellate court stages, called the appeals court's decision a "remarkable and unprecedented" decision that "took an opportunity to judicially interpose some morality into the First Amendment." The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and the Society for Professional Journalists filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the Husder case, which was accepted, diat argued the circuit court's opinion violated the First Amend...

'Open & Shut'

TMZ founder Harvey Levin to the Southern California Radio & Television News Association regarding Los Angeles authorities who obtained his phone records during an investigation into who leaked news of Mel Gibson's 2006 arrest for drunk driving The prospect of the U.S. government becoming directly involved in commercial journalism ought to be chilling for anyone who cares about freedom of speech ...

New Jersey Newspaper Appeals 'Fair Report' Ruling

The bread and butter of all media, new and old, is reporting from courts. Because the appellate decision said that the fair report privilege applies only to judicial actions, Rosen said that in modern litigation, a case could be filed, held up for two years, and then settle out of court - without ever being covered by the news media.

Student Journalists Subpoenaed in Death Penalty Case

Denying students coverage under the law could deter new sources from speaking, cause news oudets to shoulder undue costs to fight subpoenas, discourage reporting on court cases and cause newsrooms to clean out potentially valuable files in order to protect information from disclosure, attorneys said.

Government Comissions Weigh Media's Options

"In their questions, they defiantly identify that they don't want to tread on the First Amendment and they also recognize that the FCC has authority to regulate broadcast but not newspapers," said Paul Boyle, senior vice president of public policy at the Newspaper Association of America.