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Felony Charges for 6 Reporters at Inauguration Protests
- vowelless 10y agoWere they charged under HR 347 (passed in 2012), considering the Secret Service was probably in the vicinity? Edit: Oops I meant 347, not 374. Summary: https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/summary https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/summary Full text: https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/text https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/text ACLU: https://www.aclu.org/blog/how-big-deal-hr-347-criminalizing-protest-bill https://www.aclu.org/blog/how-big-deal-hr-347-criminalizing-...
- brotherjerky 10y agohttps://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/house-bill/374 https://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/house-bill/374 > Life at Conception Act - Declares that the right to life guaranteed by the Constitution is vested in each human being beginning at the moment of fertilization, cloning, or other moment at which an individual comes into being. Prohibits construing this Act to require the prosecution of any woman for the death of her unborn child. Not sure how that's relevant.
- gukov 10y agoHe meant to say HR 347.
- brotherjerky 10y agoThat makes more sense: > Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act of 2011 [sic] - Amends the federal criminal code to revise the prohibition against entering restricted federal buildings or grounds to impose criminal penalties on anyone who knowingly enters any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority. Defines "restricted buildings or grounds" as a posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area of: (1) the White House or its grounds or the Vice President's official residence or its grounds, (2) a building or grounds where the President or other person protected by the Secret Service is or will be temporarily visiting, or (3) a building or grounds so restricted due to a special event of national significance.
- gukov 10y ago> "HR 347, just signed without fanfare or news coverage by Barack Obama makes it illegal to protest anywhere the Secret Service is present. Who is present everywhere that Barack Obama goes? That's right, the Secret Service. Ergo, it is illegal to protest Barack Obama."
- aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 10y agohttps://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/summary https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/summary This bill made it a federal crime to trespass on the White House grounds, and it made other minor changes to an existing law. This bill amended a previously existing law, which can be read here, that was also about establishing a crime of being in restricted areas protected by the Secret Service. This bill's only significant change was adding the White House to the list of restricted places. Some say those existing provisions made protests illegal at political events where the Secret Service is protecting a candidate for office. Our understanding is that this is incorrect. The law applies to "cordoned off" areas or where a restriction is posted and where the general public has been cleared from. Additionally, it is unlikely the courts would uphold a restriction on access based on a political viewpoint.
- mjmahone17 10y agoThe Life at Conception Act? Why would they be charged under that?
- elastic_church 10y agofor making it this far
- FrancoDiaz 10y agoThe NYT or the charged journalists never claimed that they were actually acting in a journalistic professional role during the riots.
- AnthonyMouse 10y ago"At least six journalists were charged with felony rioting after they were arrested while covering the violent protests that took place just blocks from President Trump’s inauguration parade in Washington on Friday, according to police reports and court documents." Literally the first sentence of the article.
- FrancoDiaz 10y agoYou would've thought that the two journalists questioned by the NYT would have defended themselves by saying that they were there working a professional capacity. But they didn't. I'm not buying just because NYT says they were "covering" the protests.
- AnthonyMouse 10y agoThat is the opposite of what reporters would do. You immediately tell them you're a journalist and they give you special treatment. You don't want special treatment, first you want to write a story about what they do to non-special people.
- verroq 10y agoThen don't be surprised if these "journalists" get detained like the non-special rioters.
- rosser 10y agoFrom The Fine Article: > Mr. Engel, a Brooklyn-based journalist who writes for Vocativ, a media and technology outlet, was among those charged with felony rioting and released. He said by email on Wednesday that he was unable to comment on the case since it was active, but that he was looking forward to the day he could say more. They can't do what you're asking of them.
- spraak 10y agoI'd like more context to what is happening in the cover photo of the article, because as far as I can tell there's nothing happening to warrant pepper spray
- Nerdfest 10y agoI saw a few videos on mainstream news from that day and it looked like police were indiscriminately spraying both protesters and bystanders. I'm amazed it wasn't covered more, but I guess there's bigger problems.
- jeffdavis 10y agoThis kind of reporting encourages people to form opinions before the facts are in. None of us know what really happened there, but it will probably get sorted out soon. By that time, it's too late because we've already jumped to a conclusion.
- ramenmeal 10y agoThey were charged for lighting a limo on fire. Not exactly reporting.
- knieveltech 10y agoBecause people never get charged for stuff they didn't do.
- knowaveragejoe 10y agoWhere in the article does it state this? As far as I can tell, they were swept up with others during one of the few violent parts of the protests and are now being charged on what is effectively a technicality.
- rosser 10y ago[citation needed]
- muzz 10y agoGP is making it up, so no citation is possible
- colemickens 10y agoGood thing you read the article instead of rushing here to defend an authoritarian threatening freedom of speech. The journalists were not involved with the limo burning... they were caught up in the literally hundreds (yes, hundreds) of people arrested... when everyone knows only a tiny fraction of them were involved with the limo or the few isolated incidents of vandalism.
- 10y ago
- maxlybbert 10y agoThe media has a tendency to focus on silly things, or get details wrong, or overlook important stories. But if you want them to work overtime to cover something, simply arrest a journalist.
- suprgeek 10y agoThis is just the beginning. Our great leader has repeatedly egged on his supporters to attack the media. He constantly criticizes any media agency that dares report facts that are personally embarrassing to him. Or ones that make him look bad or anything that shows that he is not as popular as he claims, or... Imagine that you are a police officer and find some media people among a crowd (who may or may not have set a car on fire) ... The president's words demonizing the media at every turn are still fresh in your mind. What would you do? This will get much much worse....
- ioquatix 10y agoOur dear leader Trump of North America can do no wrong.
- sjg007 10y agoTrump will pardon... And I mean this in a bad way. I believe that rogue cops will view this as open season.
- problems 10y agoHe'll be lucky to get the 20% tariff on Mexican imports he currently wants. I'll be surprised if he manages to do anything seriously speech crippling.
- basicplus2 10y agoYes and his clothing he sells in America but made in Mexico will be more expensive.. so maybe he will give himself an exemption
- warbiscuit 10y agoIs that a typo? Shouldn't he be taxing exports? Taxes on imports just raise the price for Americans, it's taxes on exports that would bring money into America.
- rockdoe 10y agoTaxing imports makes American goods comparatively cheaper so it is good for local businesses. (But makes them more expensive for consumers)
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- swolchok 10y agoThe article doesn't say: what government is doing the charging? I thought the arrests were D.C. police, not Feds.
- cryptozeus 10y agoThis really does no belong here...hope mods remove it
- dsfyu404ed 10y agoThe cops don't need to be told from the top to make journalists lives hard. They've been at odds since basically forever. After all, the "shoot a black guy, get a vacation" system was working well and the media threw a wrench into it (I'm exaggerating but you get the point). They're just jumping at what looks like a chance to be jerks. They don't need to be told "the president wants you to treat the media badly". It's pretty obvious that their interests align. I think we'll see more behavior like this as they test the waters to see what they can get away with.
- exabrial 10y agoA journalist has no more rights then any other citizen for a lot of obvious reasons. They should be treated with the same due process as any one else for a lot of obvious reasons. It's really time to end authoritarianism in the USA.
- photoJ 10y agoThat is not how the news business is practiced. The assumption is that journalists are not participants and therefore are not prosecuted as such. Similar to a security guard standing near a protest.
- exabrial 10y agoPlease cite the passage in the Constitution for that?
- photoJ 10y agoYou can't be serious.
- exabrial 10y agoI am very serious, for a lot of obvious reasons. If you don't like the laws, stop voting for idiots that signed them into law. But certainly don't complain when the people you voted for approve said laws.
- exabrial 10y agoAnd for the authoritarians that voted my comment down... Please explain why a normal citizen is not entitled to the same rights as a journalist? We either have free speech or we don't. Working for a news paper should not grant you extra privileges on your rights to speak freely for or against your government.
- meanduck 10y agoI have no sympathy Im afraid. People who cheer to rob certain section of society gets to feel the burn in turn. Karma is a bitch as the saying goes. I just hope lessons have been learnt. EDIT: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-statism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-statism The people are the ones who gave their blessing and made state powerful because state promised to share the loot with them. If only people have resisted the temptation ...
- jookooloo 10y ago.
- grzm 10y agoAs far as I know, there are no topic-specific filters on HN. (There are some that filter out spam: see the [dead] submissions in https://news.ycombinator.com/newest https://news.ycombinator.com/newest for examples.) If you think a submission is inappropriate for HN, please flag and move on.
- skrebbel 10y agoSo this is what the NY Times know: - In a certain area, protest turned into riot - Cars were being set on fire - The police does a sweep, arresting 230 people - 6 of those 230 people were reporters And they chose to run a headline like this? They make it seem as if the journalists were targeted because of their profession, and that isn't what happened at all. What is this - Trump lies all the time, so as long as we anti-Trump people lie a little bit less than Trump does, we're good? Fight fire with fire? I'm slowly losing my faith in both sides of this fight.
- sigmar 10y ago>And they chose to run a headline like this? They make it seem as if the journalists were targeted because of their profession Headlines can never tell the full story. They have to consist of a low number of characters. How would you change the headline to be more accurate?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- AnthonyMouse 10y agoScooping up multiple journalists implies that they were arresting people indiscriminately. And charging them even.
- photoJ 10y agoTypically credentialed journalist would be treated differently so yes, that is the news worthy part.
- endgame 10y agohttp://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-community-and-civilization/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/23/in-favor-of-niceness-co...
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
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- photoJ 10y agoThis is significant because in order to collect the story, journalists have to stand next to people doing illegal things. Since the journalist wouldn't be there otherwise, and is not a participant, if they are mistakenly charged, then the charges are dropped. Pretty straight application of freedom of the press. This is significant and will impact coverage of many many protests if it carries thru.
- chipperyman573 10y ago>Since the journalist wouldn't be there otherwise, and is not a participant Do we know this is the case? Journalist and riot-participator are not mutually exclusive groups.
- photoJ 10y agoWe know that the term journalist implies that mutual exclusivity. Accredited individual behaving badly will loose their accreditation very very quickly. This concern of blending activists and professional journalists is something the journalism community has been concerned with for years.
- fixxer 10y agoC'mon mods. Time for another moratorium on politics.
- huragok 10y ago"Let's not confront greater society, let's just focus on bread and circuses."
- fixxer 10y agoYeah, right. We're going to solve problems by using an internet forum. Wake the fuck up.
- grokkable 10y agoThe wikipedia entry for Hacker News needs to be changed. It currently reads: "Hacker News is a social news website focusing on computer science and entrepreneurship." Politics needs to be added. What a fucking joke. Someone regex the submissions.
- jimmiolemmy 10y agoThe NYTimes propaganda machine is in full swing lately.