The Kansas reporter who was ordered to testify and reveal confidential sources related to a murder investigation has decided to fight the judge’s ruling even if it means spending time in jail, The Associated Press reported. Claire O’Brien, a journalist with the Dodge City Globe, was ordered to testify in the upcoming inquisition — much…
Read moreReporters Committee asks U.S. Supreme Court to allow journalists to challenge wiretap law
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press has filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the U.S. Supreme Court asking the justices to uphold a lower court’s ruling giving media, legal and other parties standing to challenge amendments to FISA that could irreparably damage reporter-source relationships. At issue in Clapper et. al. v. Amnesty International USA…
Read moreBankruptcy judge changes his mind on Bloomberg order
In a hearing today, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher S. Sontchi said he should have granted Bloomberg’s request to be heard on an expedited basis in objecting to his investigation of Bloomberg reporters’ sources. Bloomberg objected to the scope of the investigation of a possible violation of a confidentiality order in a bankruptcy case after the…
Read moreReporters Committee asks Colo. judge not to force reporter to reveal sources for Holmes story
Update: Judge delays deciding if Fox News reporter must testify The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press has filed an affidavit with a Colorado district court urging the judge not to compel Fox News reporter Jana Winter to reveal the identities of confidential sources who gave her information from the notebook of movie-theater shooting…
Read moreHolder expresses support for federal shield bill amendments adding judicial role to notice process
The Department of Justice is backing a bipartisan effort to turn parts of the department's report on news media policies into federal shield law provisions, Attorney General Eric Holder announced yesterday in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman. At a markup session scheduled for Thursday, a group of senators from both parties will…
Read moreSubpoenaed filmmaker ordered to hand over footage to Chevron
A New York federal judge on Thursday ruled that though a reporter’s privilege applies to a documentary filmmaker, he must still hand over unused footage to Chevron in a dispute over whether the oil company polluted the Amazon rain forest. Though Judge Lewis Kaplan was unpersuaded by Chevron’s argument that a reporters privilege does not…
Read moreConvertino turns to editors in bid to ID sources
Attorneys for Richard Convertino, the former prosecutor who until last week waslocked in a subpoena battle with a Detroit Free Press reporter over confidential sources,indicated in a court motionWednesday they will now pursue editors at the paper for the sources’ names. Their shift in attentioncomes days after reporter David Ashenfelter avoided having to reveal the…
Read moreTexas court orders reporter to testify in federal trial
A federal court in El Paso, Texas, ordered a reporter to testify in a pre-trial hearing last week as part of a federal prosecution of a Cuban anti-Castro militant accused of lying to federal immigration authorities and entering the country illegally. The Department of Justice's National Security Division subpoenaed reporter Ann Louise Bardach Nov. 5…
Read morePelosi-Nadler clash over impeachment intensifies
Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, two longtime allies, are clashing over whether to begin an impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump — a sign of how toxic the split over Trump has become for House Democrats. Nadler has twice urged Pelosi in private to open a formal impeachment inquiry, but…
Read moreAhead of Diwali, New Delhi residents fear they’ll be choking on smog instead of celebrating
In the capital city New Delhi, residents are also preparing — by scrambling to buy air purifiers and protesting the use of firecrackers. ### Diwali has created a persistent pollution problem in India for years. It’s typically celebrated with firecrackers, which contribute to already massive amounts of smog in many Indian cities — after last…
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