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donal brown

California: Winters school district trustees alleged to have violated open meeting law

donal brown May 24, 2011

The Yolo County Grand Jury reported that the Winters Joint Unified School District board of trustees violated California’s open meeting law, the Brown Act, by failing to properly place an important personnel item on the agenda. The report was released a little over a year after the board fired a popular principal at Winters High School. The Grand Jury said that the firing was not properly on the agenda for open roll call and also

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College publications director wins first round in case over speech criticizing employer

donal brown May 23, 2011

Operating under the umbrella of the Supreme Court decision limiting employee speech, a college publications director won the first round in a lawsuit against her college for firing her for saying that the college forced employees to do political work. A federal district  judge reinstated he woman’s suit saying that as a statement on corruption, the speech was a matter of public interest and protected under the First Amendment. -db From a commentary for the

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Federal appeals court reinstates defamation suit holding that broadcast omitted key details

donal brown May 23, 2011

A federal appeals court held that a West Virginia daycare owner could pursue a defamation suit against a television station for omitting the fact that alleged abuse was tied to a single incident of child-to-child contact. A trial court had found that for the station on the grounds that all statements in the broadcast were true, but the appeals court  wrote about the omission of facts, “A reasonable jury could find that this statement [the

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California union subject to defamation suit as state court denies SLAPP claim

donal brown May 23, 2011

A California labor union is facing a defamation suit after a state appellate court ruled that a company executive was justified in filing suit against the union for distributing unflattering leaflets to the executive’s neighbors. The court ruled that the leafletting concerned a private matter, did not rise to the level of public interest and so was not protected under California’s anti-SLAPP law that outlaws strategic lawsuits against public participation. -db From the Metropolitan News-Enterprise,

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Multiple sources including those on Twitter pose challenges for journalists

donal brown May 19, 2011

As one journalist described it, he has “a personalized wire service” of over 2,000 sources on Twitter who provide him with tips and on-location news reports. While this sort of access is of inestimable value, it present immense difficulties as well. Writing in GigaOM, Mathew Ingram says that with gathering so much information on the fly, reporters have to work harder than ever to separate fact from rumor and verify the credibility of sources, some

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