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FAC

A&A: Online arrest records no longer show violations

FAC November 16, 2009

Q: I have received conflicting information from public records experts and police public information officers on what law enforcement agencies have to release relating to arrest history. So, let me ask you directly, if I submit a request to a police department in California that asks if John Doe, DOB 1/1/60, has ever been arrested or involved as a party in a criminal incident, what does the law say about how the agency is supposed

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Pultizer Prize-winning reporter describes quest for truth in Las Vegas construction deaths

FAC November 10, 2009

By Donal Brown Wall Street Journal reporter Alexandra Berzon said that favorable circumstances set the stage for the stories on Las Vegas construction deaths that earned her a 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service when she was with the Las Vegas Sun. It is clear, though, that her success in the project derived centrally from her determined questioning: Why were there so many workers dying on the strip? And why were the companies able to

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First Amendment panel finds promise, pitfalls in social media

FAC November 3, 2009

By Donal Brown The panel on journalists and social media at the First Amendment Coatition Assembly offered wise advice and a few emphatic warnings, chief among them: everything a journalist puts up on Twitter or Facebook or other social media is public. Speaking at the assembly October 24 in Los Angeles on the panel entitled “Twitter with Care: Journalists and Social Media,” prominent Southern California media attorney Kelli Sager suggests that journalists put nothing up

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FAC names free speech award winners–and one loser

FAC October 22, 2009

The First Amendment Coalition, a California-based non-profit public interest group, has named the 2009 recipients of its awards for service in the cause of free speech, open government and the public’s right to know. In contrast, the Coalition also has presented its “Darkness Award,” given in recognition of conduct that thwarts freedom of speech. The Bill Farr Award, given jointly with the California Society of Newspaper Editors, goes to Carl Malamud, whose campaigns to put

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Does newspaper candidate forum constitute a quorum?

FAC October 6, 2009

Q: We invited city council candidates to our newspaper offices for an editorial endorsement forum. There are three incumbents and one challenger for three seats. We will have me, the editor, and a reporter there to ask the candidates questions about why we should endorse their candidacy. Because there are three candidates currently on the same five-member council, does that constitute a meeting that should be publicly noticed? We are planning on writing a story

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