two NC reporters found guilty of trespass while covering a story on police actions
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  two NC reporters found guilty of trespass while covering a story on police actions
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Author Topic: two NC reporters found guilty of trespass while covering a story on police actions  (Read 469 times)
dead0man
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« on: June 21, 2023, 06:15:47 AM »
« edited: June 21, 2023, 06:23:36 AM by dead0man »

on the same day the Feds went after Minneapolis cops for the same thing.

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"On Friday, June 16, Buncombe County District Attorney Todd Williams confirmed a Superior Court jury found Asheville Blade journalists Matilda Bliss and Veronica Coit guilty of misdemeanor second-degree trespass from an incident back in December 2021," reports local ABC News affiliate WLOS. "The two journalists were arrested while covering a police sweep of a homeless encampment at Aston Park and the protest that followed on Christmas night in 2021. The basis for their arrests was that the park closed at 10 p.m., so Bliss and Coit were charged with trespassing."

This was actually the second trial in the case after Bliss and Coit were earlier found guilty by Judge J. Calvin Hill who dismissed the importance of journalism to the circumstances at hand. The defendants immediately appealed to a jury trial, resulting in the June 16 verdict.

"Officers are not entitled to operate without press and public scrutiny just because it's dark out," responded Seth Stern, director of advocacy at the Freedom of the Press Foundation. "The Constitution requires that journalists be given sufficient access to public land to report the news, no matter the time."

"The two journalists should never have been on trial," agreed Katherine Jacobsen of the Committee to Protect Journalists. "They were performing a public service and recording police activity. Their conviction is a blatant violation of their First Amendment rights, and their convictions set an unsettling precedent for journalists in Asheville and the nation."

Ironically, the same day Bliss and Coit were found guilty of trespass for covering police conduct, the U.S. Justice Department criticized Minneapolis for similar violations of press freedom.

"The First Amendment requires that any restrictions on when, where, and how reporters gather information 'leave open ample alternative channels' for gathering the news," the Investigation of the City of Minneapolis and the Minneapolis Police Department notes in part. "Blanket enforcement of dispersal orders and curfews against press violates this principle because they foreclose the press from reporting about what happens after the dispersal or curfew is issued, including how police enforce those orders."


edit-the two arrested in NC work for a leftist rag that has a history of "being critical" of the local cops.
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Torie
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« Reply #1 on: June 21, 2023, 08:57:45 AM »

Given that it is Asheville, I am surprised that there was not jury nullification, or at least a hung jury. I certainly would have nullified if on the jury. Given that there were a bunch of homeless people living in the park, suddenly enforcing the curfew to keep the press out is a dog that won't hunt, at least in my brain. Where the cops go, the press should follow, unless there are safety issues, or the press disrupt the cops doing their job inappropriately.
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weatherboy1102
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« Reply #2 on: June 21, 2023, 10:50:59 AM »

what a surprise, police overstepping their bounds and people deciding it's ok because "something something we need to lick police boots constantly or else we're in anarchy something"
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