Reporters and political activists are suing in a U.S court contending that a U.S. anti-terrorism law, the NDAA, extends the definition of “supporter of terrorism” to include peaceful citizens working as activists, academic researchers, and journalists. -db From The Guardian, March 29, 2012, by Paul Harris. Full story
An Alameda County Superior Court judge ordered the release of most of the report on the November pepper-spraying of U. C. Davis students during an occupy protest. The judge wrote, “The court is not persuaded that either the Legislature or the California Supreme Court intended [the law protecting officer information] to apply whenever public entities investigated law enforcement policies, procedures or actions and to preclude all public entities from disclosing the results of those investigations
Media organizations have improvised new ways of providing real-time coverage of the historic argument in the federal health care reform cases before the U.S. Supreme Court this week in spite of the court’s rejection of requests for live video coverage. The Wall Street Journal used a team of reporters, some of whom left the proceedings to provide an up-to-date report. -db From the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, March 27, 2012, by Kristen
In the latest incident of police arresting citizens taking photos of them in the course of their duties, Philadelphia police arrested a Temple University student. The police were making a routine traffic stop outside his home. The department established guidelines on the issue last September that ordered them to expect photos, videotaping and audio recording and to allow those to proceed while discharging their duties in public areas. -db From the Reporters Committee for Freedom
At the direction of the city Attorney, the Los Angeles Fire Department announced it was not longer releasing details about fires, medical calls and traffic accidents. The department’s public information officer said they were not allowed to provide information including the locations of crashes in compliance with a federal medical privacy law. -db From the North Hollywood-Toluca Lake Patch, March 21, 2012, by City News Service and Patch Staff. Full story