'Chilling Story for Press Freedom': Raid on Small Town Newspaper Sparks First Amendment Concerns
© AP Photo / John Hanna
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The Federal Privacy Protection Act forbids law enforcement from executing a search warrant on a newsroom except in very specific circumstances.
A Kansas town with a population of just a few thousand residents has found itself in the middle of a battleground over the First Amendment after local law enforcement raided the office of the town's paper, The Marion County Record.
Eric Meyer, the owner of the newspaper, revealed that the town’s police department raided his home, the paper’s office and the home of the town’s vice mayor. His 98-year-old mother and co-owner of the paper, Joan Meyer, lived in the same house and died the day after the raid. Eric Meyer says she died from “shock and grief” that resulted from the police search.
The Friday raid saw police seized computers, cell phones, and reporting materials among other objects from Meyer’s house and the paper’s office.
Incidentally, the raid unfolded as the paper was investigating the town’s police chief, Gideon Cody, over claims they received about alleged sexual misconduct allegations from his previous job at the Kansas City Police Department.
The computers seized by the police department included information about that investigation and the sources that made those claims about Cody.
The Marion County Record covers events in the paper’s namesake county, which sits in Kansas and has roughly 11,100 citizens. The city of Marion itself had less than 2,000 residents as of the 2020 census.
The search appears to stem from a claims by Kari Newell, of restaurant Kari's Kitchen, who alleged the newspaper stole her identity to obtain information about her.
Newell’s issues with the paper appear to be longstanding. On August 1, her restaurant hosted an event for Congressman Jake Laturner, an event Meyer says he and his staff attempted to cover but were asked to leave by Cody.
7 August 2023, 17:07 GMT
Meyers says a source contacted a reporter for the paper the next day, alleging Newell had a previous DUI conviction and was driving without a license. It was then that Meyers says the paper launched its investigation into the allegation using public websites before eventually deciding against publishing a story on what they found.
Instead, he says he passed on the information to Cody because Newell was applying for a liquor license and state law prohibits liquor licenses for individuals with felony DUI convictions and also requires the holder to have a state driver’s license.
Meyer then says Vice Mayor Ruth Herbel asked the paper to send the same information to her because the city council was set to vote on Newell’s liquor license application, which the council approved with a 4-1 vote.
During that meeting, Newell admitted to having a DUI conviction and accused the paper of obtaining that information illegally. In a statement given to US media, she said she believes the paper got the information by stealing a piece of mail sent to her by the Kansas Department of Revenue.
The straw that broke the camel's back came when the outlet opted to publish an article about Newell's accusations and the subsequent council meeting. Two days later, Marion County Court Magistrate Judge Laura Viar signed a search warrant alleging the paper committed identity theft and “unlawful acts concerning computers.”
The warrant’s supporting affidavit establishing probable cause has not been released publicly.
Kansas state law requires that the judge has up to 10 days to decide if the affidavit will be released publicly, released with redactions, or placed under seal.
A Marion County District Court told local media on Monday that the affidavit was “just being uploaded to the system.”
Chris Garaffa, a privacy consultant and the cohost of CovertAction Magazine’s Bulletin podcast, told Sputnik’s Political Misfits on Monday that the case “is a chilling story for press freedom in the US.”
“This needs to be federalized at this point,” Garaffa added. “There needs to be federal eyes and transparency on this entire process. Just because this is a town of 2,000 people doesn’t mean it's not a bellwether for attacks on press everywhere else.”
In a statement posted on social media, Cody asserted his department was acting within the law and remained “unbiased.”
The Federal Privacy Protection Act protects newsrooms from being raided by the police, requiring a subpoena instead of a search warrant if law enforcement requires materials from journalists, except in specific circumstances.
Cody has implied in his post that the raid of the Record’s offices fell under one of those exceptions.
“The Act requires criminal investigators to get a subpoena instead of a search warrant when seeking “work product materials” and “documentary materials” from the press, except in circumstances, including: (1) when there is reason to believe the journalist is taking part in the underlying wrongdoing,” the post reads.
But the Reporters of Committee for Freedom of the Press has disputed that claim, condemning the raid and explaining to Cody in a letter that proceedings did not meet the criteria laid out in the act.
“This ‘suspect exception,’ which you cite, is inapplicable when the relevant conduct consists of the receipt, possession, communication, or withholding of the material, with only limited exceptions for certain federal statutes that are not at issue here,” the statement reads, adding that “for documentary material, which it appears was also seized by your department, the [Privacy Protection Act] adds two additional exceptions that permit its seizure by law enforcement, neither of which appear to apply here: (1) when notice pursuant to a subpoena would result in the destruction, alteration, or concealment of such materials; or (2) when such materials have not been produced pursuant to a court order directing compliance with a subpoena, all appellate remedies have been exhausted and there is reason to believe that delay [...] would threaten the interests of justice.”
In Newell’s statement, she claims the Record “has a LONG standing reputation of contortion,” and that the “community by large is FED up.”
