journajunkie » court filing

Times media law article enlightens

marducey — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 16:46:56 +0000

Here’s the good news: Some news organizations are not letting up on legal cases to get records and information.

Here’s the bad news: Some are.

Tim Arango of the New York Times wrote an excellent piece about how Hearst and the Associated Press are continuing to fight for legal records, even if it costs them.

Unfortunately, he also writes that smaller news organizations — regional and local — have had to cut legal costs along with other costs. And the head of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press told him that she’s hearing about hard times for media lawyers.

I hope the Times continues to follow up on this issue. At a time when cost-cutting is the norm in the news industry, we must monitor how this cost-cutting is impacting journalism’s watchdog role.

Kudos to the Times for doing just that.

Circumsion claim cause for libel suit

marducey — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:17:30 +0000

The New York Times’s Sewell Chan writes about an unusual libel case involving whether it is libelous to incorrectly report that someone is not circumcised.

A Queens man is suing Centropa, a group with the mission of preserving Jewish culture, for just that. The story is worth a read.

The Watchdogs are alive …

marducey — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 17:53:58 +0000

The New York Times and Los Angeles Times have petitioned to get access to secret government records about the anthrax case from 2001. No word on the ruling yet, but I applaud the effort. This ruined Dr. Stephen Hatfill’s life and just because it happened years ago does not mean journalists should let it drop.

If the government was wrong about Hatfill, a man then Attorney General John Ashcroft labeled “a person of interest” in interviews with numerous TV shows, why should we believe it is right about its accusations against a dead man? Hatfill could and did fight the accusations. Bruce Ivins has no such option.

Oh, and Ashcroft’s folly merely cost taxpayers $5.82 million.