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{
"title": "Fourth subpoena issued for independent journalist’s phone records",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/fourth-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/",
"first_published_at": "2023-06-26T18:27:20.665497Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-10T19:39:50.951327Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-10T19:39:50.769746Z",
"date": "2017-10-06",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Laredo",
"longitude": -99.50754,
"latitude": 27.50641,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"fomjc\">Police in Laredo, Texas, subpoenaed the phone records of independent journalist Priscilla Villarreal for the fourth and final time on Oct. 6, 2017, as part of an investigation into a confidential source.</p><p data-block-key=\"9qdc8\">Villarreal — based in Laredo, Texas, and often known by her pen name “La Gordiloca” — published the name of a Border Patrol agent who died by suicide on her Facebook page in April, before the Laredo Police Department’s official release about the incident. The LPD opened an investigation to identify who leaked Villarreal the name.</p><p data-block-key=\"2n108\">According to an arrest warrant approval form, an LPD officer first subpoenaed Villarreal’s toll records, or call logs, on <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/prosecutors-subpoenaed-citizen-journalist-cell-phone-during-investigation/\">July 27</a> and then again on <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/second-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/\">Sept. 14</a>. A <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/third-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/\">third subpoena</a> was issued on Sept. 28 seeking copies of Villarreal’s text messages from July 26 through Sept. 13.</p><p data-block-key=\"e038g\">On Oct. 6, the investigating officer sent a fourth and final subpoena seeking text messages from Jan. 1 through July 26. It was not immediately clear when AT&T provided the requested records, but references to phone records provided by the telecommunication company indicate that the records were turned over.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ic91\">Villarreal was<a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/citizen-journalist-arrested-after-publishing-information-local-police/\"> arrested in December</a> and charged with two third-degree felonies for “misuse of official information.” An attorney representing Villarreal filed a writ of habeas corpus challenging the constitutionality of the charges in February 2018.</p><p data-block-key=\"a9ig7\">“Today, in the State of Texas, it is illegal to simply ask a public servant for information if the information sought happens to be described in an obscure list of information categories that are subject to discretionary disclosure — rather than mandatory,” attorney Oscar Peña wrote. “The only thing keeping journalists from being prosecuted for this every day is the mercy of the police, the prosecutors and the political cost attendant. This too is alarming.”</p><p data-block-key=\"1ut1t\">A Texas state judge ruled in favor of Villarreal in March 2018 and dismissed the charges, finding that the statute the journalist was charged under was unconstitutionally vague.</p><p data-block-key=\"6i0nf\">In April 2019, Villarreal <a href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/405495470/Priscilla-Villarreal-Complaint-SDTX\">filed a civil lawsuit</a> against the city of Laredo, Webb County and 10 law enforcement officials. The case was initially dismissed by a U.S. magistrate judge in May 2020, but a federal court of appeals <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/citizen-journalist-arrested-after-publishing-information-local-police/\">reversed the decision</a> in November 2021.</p><p data-block-key=\"914qd\">In August 2022, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued a substitute decision with the addition of a dissenting opinion from Chief Judge Priscilla Richman and a concurring opinion from Judge James C. Ho.</p><p data-block-key=\"4d010\">JT Morris, a senior attorney at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression who is representing Villarreal’s appeal, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the appellate court decided to rehear the case “en banc,” meaning that the entire bench of active judges for the court reheard the case.</p><p data-block-key=\"buho8\">Arguments before the judges were held in January 2023, Morris said, and the court’s ruling is now pending.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
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"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": "5:19-cv-00048",
"case_type": "CIVIL",
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": "AT&T",
"third_party_business": "telecom company",
"legal_order_venue": "State",
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Texas",
"abbreviation": "TX"
},
"updates": [
"(2024-10-15 17:15:00+00:00) Supreme Court revives Texas journalist’s arrest-related lawsuit",
"(2025-04-08 15:23:00+00:00) Appeals court again dismisses Texas journalist’s arrest-related lawsuit",
"(2024-01-23 12:02:00+00:00) Divided federal appeals court won’t revive Texas journalist’s lawsuit"
],
"case_statuses": [
"dismissed"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Subpoena/Legal Order"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Priscilla Villarreal (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Independent journalist Aminah Ali arrested in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalist-aminah-ali-arrested-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-06T06:49:26.414872Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-03-20T20:30:36.962565Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-03-20T20:30:36.867528Z",
"date": "2017-10-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"x3drp\">Aminah Ali — a St. Louis-based independent journalist who founded local news site “Real STL News” — was arrested while reporting on a demonstration on Oct. 3, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"xizjb\">That day, protesters in St. Louis shut down Highway 40, marching on the interstate and blocking traffic. The demonstration was a response to the acquittal in September of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a Black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"jvncl\">After the group of protesters exited the highway, lines of police officers enclosed them in a “kettle” and then ordered them to sit on the ground and began to arrest them. Ali, who was covering the march for Real STL News, was also arrested.</p><p data-block-key=\"bcsjb\">Real STL News later published a video that shows Ali, with her hands zip-tied behind her back, waiting in a holding area in the St. Louis jail.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https://twitter.com/MissJupiter1957?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@MissJupiter1957</a> our reporter in jail at the justice center after the protests <a href=\"https://t.co/BzXdqHEQbS\">pic.twitter.com/BzXdqHEQbS</a></p>— RealStlNews (@RealStlNews) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/RealStlNews/status/915656183054241793?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 4, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"nwv87\">“I am the founder of Real STL News and I've been apprehended,” Ali says in the video. “Once again, this is Aminah Ali, this is the founder of Real STL News, and I'm locked up. I wasn't doing anything illegal. I let them know that I was media, and I was still apprehended.”</p><p data-block-key=\"665lg\">According to Real STL News, Ali was released from jail on the morning of Oct. 4.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-10-06_at_2.45.02.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"hi5gq\">Independent journalist Aminah Ali shows off her zip-tied hands in a screengrab from a video filmed inside a holding area in the St. Louis jail.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-10-04",
"detention_date": "2017-10-03",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2018-10-04 16:31:00+00:00) Charge dropped against journalist arrested at St. Louis protest"
],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Aminah Ali (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "People's World reporter Al Neal arrested and jailed for over 24 hours",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/peoples-world-reporter-al-neal-arrested-and-jailed-over-24-hours/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-05T21:52:17.175728Z",
"last_published_at": "2023-09-18T16:20:50.829278Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2023-09-18T16:20:50.684730Z",
"date": "2017-10-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"kmgx8\">Al Neal, the St. Louis bureau chief for progressive online newspaper People’s World, was arrested and jailed for 26 hours while covering protests in St. Louis, Missouri, on Oct. 3, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"ox6ov\">That day, protesters in St. Louis <a href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/protesters-close-eastbound-highway-in-st-louis/article_be681e7d-db87-5754-8799-12406397ccb0.html\">shut down</a> Highway 40, marching on the interstate and blocking traffic. The demonstration was a response to the acquittal in September of of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a Black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"hvwix\">Neal filmed part of the protest and <a href=\"https://www.instagram.com/p/BZzpEtmg5JK/\">posted</a> the video on his Instagram page. The video shows protesters peacefully marching and chanting.</p><p data-block-key=\"6dzau\">Neal told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that he did not witness any water bottles or other objects being thrown at police officers. He also said that the crowd was quick to comply with police orders, including moving from the street to the sidewalk. </p><p data-block-key=\"ibo43\">After the group of protesters exited the highway, lines of police officers enclosed them in a “kettle” and then ordered them to sit on the ground. Around 9:30 p.m., police began arresting everyone present at the protest march, including journalists.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/police?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#police</a> are arresting everyone now. Including members of the <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/press?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#press</a> visibly showing credentials. —<a href=\"https://twitter.com/PeoplesWorld?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@PeoplesWorld</a></p>— A. A. Neal (@Al_Neal_STL) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/Al_Neal_STL/status/915388642549538816?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 4, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"2rwv9\">Neal said that he was wearing a press badge and standing on the sidewalk with a group of journalists when he was handcuffed. He said that he told a police officer that he was a journalist, and the officer responded, “We don’t care, you’re getting arrested.”</p><p data-block-key=\"y0oyu\">Neal said that he asked the police to cuff his hands in the front instead of behind him, due to his bad shoulder. He said that a police officer refused and told him, “We don’t care, too bad, just wait.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5lgx7\">Neal said that he was transported to the St. Louis city jail, where he was detained in a holding cell for hours. Later that night, he tweeted a photo of the inside of the holding cell.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Now sitting in a holding cell w/ an elected official, legal observers& other members of the <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/press?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#press</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stockleyprotest?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stockleyprotest</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stl?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stl</a> - <a href=\"https://twitter.com/PeoplesWorld?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@PeoplesWorld</a></p>— A. A. Neal (@Al_Neal_STL) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/Al_Neal_STL/status/915428546830618624?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 4, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\r\n\r\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">A view from inside. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stl?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stl</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/StockleyProtest?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#StockleyProtest</a> — <a href=\"https://twitter.com/PeoplesWorld?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@PeoplesWorld</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/FwJvRHdDRo\">pic.twitter.com/FwJvRHdDRo</a></p>— A. A. Neal (@Al_Neal_STL) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/Al_Neal_STL/status/915430586847780864?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 4, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"xaast\">After being detained for more than a full day, Neal was finally released around 11:30 p.m. on Oct. 4. He is being charged with trespassing, a misdemeanor.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/alneal_80vrBf7.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"endgt\">Al Neal waits in a holding cell at the St. Louis city jail, after being arrested on Oct. 3, 2017.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-10-04",
"detention_date": "2017-10-03",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"stopped_previously": false,
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"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2018-10-04 00:00:00+00:00) Charge dropped against journalist arrested at St. Louis protest"
],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Al Neal (People's World)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": null
},
{
"title": "Freelance photographer Daniel Shular arrested in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-photographer-daniel-shular-arrested-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-04T20:57:27.848782Z",
"last_published_at": "2023-09-18T16:52:36.922943Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2023-09-18T16:52:36.638564Z",
"date": "2017-10-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"eizbl\">Daniel Shular — a St. Louis-based freelance photographer whose work has been published in NBC News, Xinhua and Riverfront Times — was arrested on Oct. 3, 2017, after covering a demonstration in St. Louis, Missouri.</p><p data-block-key=\"kwlf5\">That day, protesters in St. Louis shut down Highway 40, marching on the interstate and blocking traffic. The demonstration was a response to the acquittal in September of of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a Black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"55yw8\">Shular covered the protest. After the group of protesters exited the highway, lines of police officers enclosed them in a "kettle" and then announced that they would all be arrested.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Everyone is being arrested including press <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stockleyprotest?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stockleyprotest</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stlouis?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stlouis</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stlouisprotest?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stlouisprotest</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/kettle?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#kettle</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/n9F5gWyz7u\">pic.twitter.com/n9F5gWyz7u</a></p>— Daniel Shular (@xshularx) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/xshularx/status/915387776102752257?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 4, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\r\n\r\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">I'm being arrested</p>— Daniel Shular (@xshularx) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/xshularx/status/915388193817726976?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 4, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"zxefl\">Shular told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that officers ignored him when he said that he was a member of the press. He said that he was carrying two professional DSLR cameras and wearing a National Press Photographers Association press badge. Officers ordered him to sit on the ground and then arrested him.</p><p data-block-key=\"loucd\">He said that the police never told him specifically why he was being arrested. During the booking and process, he said, he saw a document that listed the charge as “trespassing.”</p><p data-block-key=\"vo4wf\">Shular said that he was held for about 17 hours before being released. His cameras were returned to him after he was released.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/shular.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-10-04",
"detention_date": "2017-10-03",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": "returned in full",
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"actor": "law enforcement",
"border_point": null,
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"assailant": null,
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"legal_order_venue": null,
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"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [
{
"quantity": 2,
"equipment": "camera"
},
{
"quantity": 2,
"equipment": "camera lens"
}
],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2018-10-04 00:00:00+00:00) Charge dropped against photographer arrested at St. Louis protest"
],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Equipment Search or Seizure"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Daniel Shular (Freelance)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": null
},
{
"title": "Independent journalist Jon Ziegler arrested in St. Louis for second time",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalist-jon-ziegler-arrested-st-louis-second-time/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-04T09:25:26.001908Z",
"last_published_at": "2023-09-18T16:50:49.222907Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2023-09-18T16:50:48.986606Z",
"date": "2017-10-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"y7a5t\">Independent journalist Jon Ziegler was arrested in St. Louis on Oct. 3, 2017, after livestreaming a demonstration on Highway 40. Ziegler was <a href=\"/all-incidents/independent-livestreamer-jon-ziegler-pepper-sprayed-and-arrested-st-louis/\">previously arrested in St. Louis on Sept. 17</a>, while covering another protest.</p><p data-block-key=\"ra3na\">On Oct. 3, protesters in St. Louis shut down Highway 40, marching on the interstate and blocking traffic. The demonstration was a response to the acquittal in September of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a Black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"xi4bc\">Ziegler was one of the journalists who provided live coverage of the march. Once the group of protesters exited the highway, lines of police officers enclosed them in a "kettle" and then ordered them to sit on the ground and began to arrest them. Ziegler and other journalists covering the march were also arrested.</p><p data-block-key=\"vf24v\">Ziegler's livestream of the march captured his arrest and the arrest of other journalists.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-video\">\n\n<figure class=\"inline-media full-width\">\n <div style=\"padding-bottom: 56.25%;\" class=\"responsive-object\">\n <iframe width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/KyLjVksSP2o?start=2550&feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen></iframe>\n</div>\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n \n <p data-block-key=\"6hopl\">St. Louis police perform a mass arrest of protesters, legal observers, and journalists.</p>\n \n \n <p>Rebelutionary Z</p>\n \n </figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-10-04_at_4.38.24.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"sius5\">A screengrab of a video filmed by The Young Turks shows Jon Ziegler (in purple) sitting on the ground shortly before being arrested by St. Louis police on Oct. 3, 2017.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2018-10-04 00:00:00+00:00) Charge dropped against journalist arrested at St. Louis protest"
],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Jon Ziegler (Independent)"
],
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"type_of_denial": null
},
{
"title": "The Young Turks cameraman Ty Bayliss arrested in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/tyt-cameraman-ty-bayliss-arrested-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-04T09:24:11.488649Z",
"last_published_at": "2023-09-18T16:49:51.107307Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2023-09-18T16:49:50.846539Z",
"date": "2017-10-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"zdlpi\">Ty Bayliss — a cameraman and editor for the progressive online news organization The Young Turks — was arrested along with reporter Jordan Chariton after filming a demonstration in St. Louis on Oct. 3, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"59s7r\">That day, protesters in St. Louis shut down Highway 40, marching on the interstate and blocking traffic. The demonstration was a response to the acquittal in September of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a Black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"5ly88\">Chariton and Bayliss followed the group and interviewed protesters as they marched on the highway. After the group of protesters exited the highway, lines of police officers enclosed them in a "kettle" and then ordered them to sit on the ground and began to arrest them. Chariton, Bayliss and other journalists covering the march were also arrested.</p><p data-block-key=\"meljh\">"Our reporter @JordanChariton and cameraman/editor Ty Bayliss have been arrested by St. Louis Police. Clear violation of first amendment," TYT founder and host Cenk Uygur <a href=\"https://twitter.com/cenkuygur/status/915405101912645633\">tweeted</a>. "TYT reporter & cameraman were covering St. Louis protests when police surrounded them and arrested them. We demand their immediate release."</p><p data-block-key=\"e2wgu\">TYT published a video on Youtube, filmed by Bayliss, that shows police arresting both him and Chariton. Bayliss appears to be one of the first people arrested.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-video\">\n\n<figure class=\"inline-media full-width\">\n <div style=\"padding-bottom: 56.25%;\" class=\"responsive-object\">\n <iframe width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/wfTZgPMQX-0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen></iframe>\n</div>\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n \n <p data-block-key=\"6gzac\">St. Louis police arrest TYT reporter Jordan Chariton and cameraman Ty Bayliss.</p>\n \n \n <p>The Young Turks</p>\n \n </figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"4nbxe\">Bayliss and Chariton were arrested despite wearing press badges and telling police officers on the scene that they were members of the press. Officers told them that they were under arrest "for being on the highway."</p><p data-block-key=\"8s7ll\">Uygur, the founder of TYT, criticized the arrests of Bayliss and Chariton in a short video statement posted on Youtube.</p><p data-block-key=\"8fi2p\">"We're demanding their immediate release," Uygur says in the video. "This is outrageous. We had camera guys there because that's our job. There is a very legitimate and ongoing protest in St. Louis. They believe that the community is not being treated fairly, and we went to go cover it. That's exactly what we're supposed to do as the press. Apparently, the police didn't like that. You can hear people on the scene saying that they're arresting people with cameras first. So it's the exact opposite of what they're supposed to do. They're supposed to let the press do their jobs, and they didn't."</p><p data-block-key=\"eq9nt\">After being detained for almost 20 hours, Bayliss and Chariton were released from jail.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-10-04_at_4.23.58.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"0gb9e\">A screengrab from a livestream filmed by Jon Ziegler shows St. Louis police officers arresting TYT cameraman Ty Bayliss on Oct. 3, 2017.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-10-04",
"detention_date": "2017-10-03",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"equipment_seized": [],
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"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2018-10-04 00:00:00+00:00) Charge dropped against journalist arrested at St. Louis protest"
],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Ty Bayliss (The Young Turks)"
],
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"type_of_denial": null
},
{
"title": "The Young Turks reporter Jordan Chariton arrested in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/tyt-reporter-jordan-chariton-arrested-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-04T09:23:14.717840Z",
"last_published_at": "2023-09-18T16:51:57.233455Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2023-09-18T16:51:56.994513Z",
"date": "2017-10-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"solyb\">Jordan Chariton, a reporter for the progressive online news organization The Young Turks, was arrested along with cameraman Ty Bayliss after filming a demonstration in St. Louis on Oct. 3, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"ywhhc\">That day, protesters in St. Louis shut down Highway 40, marching on the interstate and blocking traffic. The demonstration was a response to the acquittal in September of of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a Black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"ynanw\">Chariton and Bayliss followed the group and interviewed protesters as they marched on the highway. After the group of protesters exited the highway, lines of police officers enclosed them in a "kettle" and then ordered them to sit on the ground and began to arrest them. Chariton, Bayliss and other journalists covering the march were also arrested.</p><p data-block-key=\"3d5zg\">"Our reporter @JordanChariton and cameraman/editor Ty Bayliss have been arrested by St. Louis Police. Clear violation of first amendment," TYT founder and host Cenk Uygur <a href=\"https://twitter.com/cenkuygur/status/915405101912645633\">tweeted</a>. "TYT reporter & cameraman were covering St. Louis protests when police surrounded them and arrested them. We demand their immediate release."</p><p data-block-key=\"xtb5a\">TYT published a video on Youtube, filmed by Bayliss, that shows police arresting both him and Chariton.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-video\">\n\n<figure class=\"inline-media full-width\">\n <div style=\"padding-bottom: 56.25%;\" class=\"responsive-object\">\n <iframe width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/wfTZgPMQX-0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen></iframe>\n</div>\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n \n <p data-block-key=\"9a6ob\">St. Louis police arrest TYT reporter Jordan Chariton and cameraman Ty Bayliss.</p>\n \n \n <p>The Young Turks</p>\n \n </figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"yjbk4\">"So they're arresting, it seems, journalists who covered a peaceful demonstration," Chariton can be heard saying in the video, after Bayliss is arrested. "I thought there was a freedom of the press and a First Amendment, but I guess not in St. Louis."</p><p data-block-key=\"ao1sy\">Bayliss and Chariton were arrested despite wearing press badges and telling police officers on the scene that they were members of the press. Officers told them that they were under arrest "for being on the highway."</p><p data-block-key=\"rv4it\">Uygur, the founder of TYT, criticized the arrests of Bayliss and Chariton in a short video statement posted on Youtube.</p><p data-block-key=\"e4jc0\">"We're demanding their immediate release," Uygur says in the video. "This is outrageous. We had camera guys there because that's our job. There is a very legitimate and ongoing protest in St. Louis. They believe that the community is not being treated fairly, and we went to go cover it. That's exactly what we're supposed to do as the press. Apparently, the police didn't like that. You can hear people on the scene saying that they're arresting people with cameras first. So it's the exact opposite of what they're supposed to do. They're supposed to let the press do their jobs, and they didn't."</p><p data-block-key=\"ddu22\">After being detained for almost 20 hours, Chariton and Bayliss were released from jail.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-10-04_at_5.20.06.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"x2apt\">TYT reporter Jordan Chariton reports live from St. Louis on October 3, 2017, shortly before being arrested.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-10-04",
"detention_date": "2017-10-03",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
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"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
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"(2018-10-04 00:00:00+00:00) Charge dropped against reporter arrested at St. Louis protest"
],
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge"
],
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"Jordan Chariton (The Young Turks)"
],
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"type_of_denial": null
},
{
"title": "Indiana high school implements policy of prior review after controversial publication",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/indiana-high-school-implements-policy-prior-review-after-controversial-publication/",
"first_published_at": "2019-03-21T17:25:57.087373Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-02-28T21:48:24.313318Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-02-28T21:48:24.233757Z",
"date": "2017-10-01",
"exact_date_unknown": true,
"city": "Plainfield",
"longitude": -86.39944,
"latitude": 39.70421,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"mj2kz\">Student journalists at Plainfield High School in Plainfield, Indiana, have been censored by school administrators for their reporting, according to the student co-editor of the school's paper.<br/><br/> Plainfield High School <a href=\"https://freedom.press/news/inside-fight-prevent-censorship-indiana-student-journalists/\">implemented a policy</a> of content review prior to publication after its publication, the Quaker Shaker, published an issue that focused on dating and relationships in October 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"2kfpn\">The issue, called the Shakedown, was the magazine’s first “special topic” edition, exploring the ins and outs of relationships in high school. It featured polls about the prevalence of sexting and topics like dating violence.<br/><br/> After some parents and school administrators took issue with the content, a <a href=\"https://www.indystar.com/story/news/education/2018/01/25/plainfield-high-student-journalists-say-they-being-censored-lawmakers-could-help-them/1065190001/\">new school policy was implemented</a> requiring approval from the principal and an advisory committee before publishing, <a href=\"https://freedom.press/news/inside-fight-prevent-censorship-indiana-student-journalists/\">according to Plainfield High School journalism adviser</a> Michelle Burress.</p><p data-block-key=\"204qv\">Co-editor of the Quaker Shaker Anu Nattam said that after the policy was in place, the publication was forced to change the name of their special edition issues to the Shakeout because the school argued that the name Shakedown had mafia connotations.</p><p data-block-key=\"xuk7y\">“We’ve also had to change quotes, and delete quotes for trivial things that make no sense,” <a href=\"https://freedom.press/news/inside-fight-prevent-censorship-indiana-student-journalists/\">Nattam told the Freedom of the Press Foundation</a> in 2018. She also noted that they were asked to change the cover photo of one magazine issue because merely it showed a picture of a clothed posterior.</p><p data-block-key=\"wzzpv\">But it is her responsibility as a student journalist, Nattam said, to report on issues that are relevant to the student body, even if they might be controversial.</p><p data-block-key=\"0wv3g\">Nattam’s adviser Burress said that students have self-censored since the policy was put in place, and they worry about everything they write coming under intense scrutiny. “They are shying away from topics that normally they would not hesitate to cover because they do not want to get shot down,” she said last year. “More than ever this year, students are saying that they do not want to be quoted or pictured in the news magazine or yearbook.”</p><p data-block-key=\"hfd95\">Nattam agrees. “People need to realize that by limiting press freedom for students, they are limiting their education. That’s what I feel like was done to me and my staff—our education was compromised, because we can’t be put in the same environment as a professional journalist. So, we can’t prepare for a career in journalism if that's what we choose to do.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Plainfield_other.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"31bn1\">Indiana student journalists, including Anu Nattam, center, who holds Plainfield High School's magazine, testified in 2018 in favor of a state bill that would have prohibited schools from encroaching on students’ speech rights.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
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"state": {
"name": "Indiana",
"abbreviation": "IN"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [
"[Plainfield High School] Quaker Shaker"
],
"tags": [
"student journalism"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Other Incident"
],
"targeted_journalists": [],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Reporter flagged for additional screening when leaving the U.S., questioned about work",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/reporter-flagged-additional-screening-when-leaving-us-questioned-about-work/",
"first_published_at": "2019-12-10T20:47:50.455003Z",
"last_published_at": "2022-08-22T20:28:47.387563Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2022-08-22T20:28:47.317771Z",
"date": "2017-09-30",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "New York",
"longitude": -74.00597,
"latitude": 40.71427,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"m0o59\">A reporter — who asked that his name not be used for fear of reprisal — was flagged for secondary screening in New York City while traveling to Istanbul, Turkey, on Sept. 30, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"pqwrf\">The reporter, who is a U.S. citizen, told the Committee to Protect Journalists that he was taken aside by a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer while departing from JFK International Airport.</p><p data-block-key=\"8rak6\">After asking the routine questions about addresses and contact information, the reporter said the CBP officer asked about his work. The questioning included what topics the reporter covers and whether he uses the messaging applications WhatsApp or Viber. The reporter also told CPJ that the officer asked him to sign a paper documenting how much currency he was traveling with.</p><p data-block-key=\"jdxz6\">During the questioning, the reporter asked the CBP officer his name. The reporter said the question seemed to make the officer very uncomfortable, and the officer tried to backpedal to avoid disclosing it. The reporter insisted and the officer eventually gave his name.</p><p data-block-key=\"y95ws\">Citing his frustration with being stopped despite belonging to CBP’s Trusted Travelers Programs, which are designed to expedite security, the reporter told CPJ that after this incident he filed a Freedom of Information Act and Privacy Act request. He received a response within six weeks that showed that he had been targeted for additional screening but not why.</p><p data-block-key=\"04lwy\">In addition to having Global Entry, the reporter said, he now also carries a printed copy of his FOIA when he travels.</p><p data-block-key=\"a93gq\">“It’s clear to me that these interrogations really depend on the officer, what questions they ask,” the reporter told CPJ.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": null,
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"image_caption": "",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": "John F. Kennedy International Airport",
"target_us_citizenship_status": "U.S. citizen",
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": "no",
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": "yes",
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
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"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "New York",
"abbreviation": "NY"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [
"United States"
],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Border Stop"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Anonymous reporter 2"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": null
},
{
"title": "St. Louis Post-Dispatch photographer, Christian Gooden, pepper-sprayed by the St. Louis Metropolitan Police",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/st-louis-post-dispatch-photographer-christian-gooden-pepper-sprayed-st-louis-metropolitan-police/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-21T00:03:24.409353Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-04-16T18:42:39.034577Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-04-16T18:42:38.920258Z",
"date": "2017-09-29",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"qibep\">Christian Gooden, a photographer for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, was pepper-sprayed by the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department while covering protests in St. Louis on Sept. 29, 2017, according to a <a href=\"http://www.unitedmediaguild.org/index.php/2017/10/05/\">news report</a> by the United Media Guild.</p><p data-block-key=\"em0oi\">Gooden told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that he was taking photographs in between two groups of protesters when he heard that a demonstrator had been tased. He, along with several protesters, turned back to document the St. Louis police walking a demonstrator to a van in handcuffs. “The police sprayed everyone in front of the police line,” Gooden said. He anticipated the spraying, so he backed up turned away to avoid the spray. </p><p data-block-key=\"gzxjr\">Gooden said he continued to take pictures once he thought the police were done spraying, but he was hit by a second stream of pepper spray. He turned his back to avoid posing a threat, but he estimated the spraying lasted five or six seconds.</p><p data-block-key=\"3qjbm\">“There didn’t seem to be a reason to spray the line,” he said. “They were agitated and loud, but no one was coming to put hands on police.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fmldk\">He told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that he felt the spray on his neck and collar, and he kept turning his head to protect his face. “It felt like he was trying to get around to my ears and eyes,” Gooden said.</p><p data-block-key=\"nhtna\">Gooden said that while he was not wearing his press badge, he was carrying two large cameras and a photo bag, and had been covering the protests as a photographer for multiple nights.</p><p data-block-key=\"ng4w0\">The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department did not immediately respond to requests to comment.</p></div>",
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"teaser": "Christian Gooden, a photographer for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, was pepper-sprayed by the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department on Sept. 29, 2017, while covering protests in St. Louis",
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"chemical irritant"
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{
"title": "Independent livestreamer, Heather De Mian, pepper sprayed by St. Louis police",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-livestreamer-heather-demian-pepper-sprayed-st-louis-police/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-18T21:45:00.529093Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T23:46:11.165299Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-03T23:46:11.055230Z",
"date": "2017-09-29",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"td81y\">Heather De Mian, an independent livestreamer and photographer, was pepper sprayed by St. Louis police while filming protests in St. Louis on Sept. 29, 2017, according to her tweets and <a href=\"https://www.pscp.tv/MissJupiter1957/1vAxRNAgDOyxl?t=1402\">livestream video</a> of the incident.</p><p data-block-key=\"dercs\">In <a href=\"https://twitter.com/NassimBnchabane/status/913965086955491328\">an interview</a> with St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Nassim Benchaabane after the protest, De Mian said she was livestreaming the demonstration to Periscope when she was informed by protesters that the St. Louis police tased a protester. She moved closer, trying to film the arrest of the protester, when police allegedly sprayed her with a chemical agent from the side.</p><p data-block-key=\"rpuvo\">De Mian regularly documents protests by livestreaming them on Periscope and uploading them to her Youtube channel, "Heather DeMian," and her Twitter account, @MissJupiter1957.</p><p data-block-key=\"o4aaf\">In the Periscope video, De Mian can be seen asking the officers multiple times why she was sprayed and why they failed to give a dispersal order. In the video, one officer points at De Mian and says repeatedly, “time to go."</p><p data-block-key=\"22qvv\">“I should have to be a threat before someone fucking maces me,” she says later on the livestream.</p><p data-block-key=\"fn2pd\">De Mian later tweeted that the pepper spray had a severe effect on her because she has Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a genetic connective tissue disorder.</p><p data-block-key=\"i8srl\">"B/c of my #EDS, my physical reaction to pepperspray is different. It takes a few minutes to feel it where I have mucus membranes in my face," she tweeted. "Didn't really feel it much on my arms & medics washed where there was visible orange liquid, but not whole arm, so missed where fine spray. So while I didn't feel an initial reaction on my arms much, where it sat on the skin for longer, it damaged the skin. #EDS"</p><p data-block-key=\"ow4zk\">The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"und\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/STLProtests?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#STLProtests</a> 2 <a href=\"https://t.co/Md7vRrOjyj\">https://t.co/Md7vRrOjyj</a></p>— Heather ♿📷📱🔭 (@MissJupiter1957) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/MissJupiter1957/status/913950548012834816?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 30, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\r\n\r\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https://twitter.com/MissJupiter1957?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@MissJupiter1957</a> a livestreamer in a wheelchair, says she was pepper sprayed while filming after police teased/arrested a man <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/stlverdict?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#stlverdict</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/dhjtMdBO4G\">pic.twitter.com/dhjtMdBO4G</a></p>— Nascream Bloodaabane (@NassimBnchabane) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/NassimBnchabane/status/913965086955491328?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 30, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"8hw3n\">Heather De Mian, an independent livestreamer, was pepper-sprayed by St. Louis police while filming a protest.</p>",
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"name": "Missouri",
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"(2019-07-17 14:59:00+00:00) St. Louis officer charged with assault for 2017 pepper-spraying of livestreamer Heather De Mian, protesters",
"(2023-11-16 16:58:00+00:00) State appeals court dismisses reporter’s First Amendment claims",
"(2021-05-28 00:00:00+00:00) Officer acquitted on felony assault charges for pepper-spraying protesters"
],
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"dismissed"
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"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
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{
"title": "Third subpoena issued for independent journalist’s phone records",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/third-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/",
"first_published_at": "2023-06-26T18:30:41.044218Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-10T19:40:06.433012Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-10T19:40:06.239243Z",
"date": "2017-09-28",
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"city": "Laredo",
"longitude": -99.50754,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"84353\">Police in Laredo, Texas, subpoenaed the phone records of independent journalist Priscilla Villarreal for the third time on Sept. 28, 2017, as part of an investigation into a confidential source, according to filings reviewed by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. Her communication records have been subpoenaed at least four times.</p><p data-block-key=\"88bg5\">Villarreal — known by her pen name “La Gordiloca” — published the name of a Border Patrol agent who died by suicide on her Facebook page in April, before the Laredo Police Department’s official release about the incident. The LPD opened an investigation to identify who leaked Villarreal the name.</p><p data-block-key=\"f7rli\">According to an arrest warrant approval form, an LPD officer first subpoenaed Villarreal’s call log records on <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/prosecutors-subpoenaed-citizen-journalist-cell-phone-during-investigation/\">July 27</a> and then again on <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/second-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/\">Sept. 14</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"bcjuc\">On Sept. 28, the officer sent a third subpoena seeking text messages from July 26 through Sept. 13 for the phone numbers belonging to both Villarreal and her suspected source. It was not immediately clear when AT&T provided the requested records, but references to phone records provided by the telecommunication company indicate that the records were turned over.</p><p data-block-key=\"qu3a\">An additional subpoena for Villarreal’s text messages was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/fourth-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/\">filed on Oct. 6</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"ie8o\">Villarreal was<a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/citizen-journalist-arrested-after-publishing-information-local-police/\"> arrested in December</a> and charged with two third-degree felonies for “misuse of official information.” An attorney representing Villarreal filed a writ of habeas corpus challenging the constitutionality of the charges in February 2018.</p><p data-block-key=\"9k57m\">“Today, in the State of Texas, it is illegal to simply ask a public servant for information if the information sought happens to be described in an obscure list of information categories that are subject to discretionary disclosure — rather than mandatory,” attorney Oscar Peña wrote. “The only thing keeping journalists from being prosecuted for this every day is the mercy of the police, the prosecutors and the political cost attendant. This too is alarming.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9akhr\">A Texas state judge ruled in favor of Villarreal in March 2018 and dismissed the charges, finding that the statute the journalist was charged under was unconstitutionally vague.</p><p data-block-key=\"fdd49\">In April 2019, Villarreal <a href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/405495470/Priscilla-Villarreal-Complaint-SDTX\">filed a civil lawsuit</a> against the city of Laredo, Webb County and 10 law enforcement officials. The case was initially dismissed by a U.S. magistrate judge in May 2020, but a federal court of appeals <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/citizen-journalist-arrested-after-publishing-information-local-police/\">reversed the decision</a> in November 2021.</p><p data-block-key=\"er01p\">In August 2022, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued a substitute decision with the addition of a dissenting opinion from Chief Judge Priscilla Richman and a concurring opinion from Judge James C. Ho.</p><p data-block-key=\"1fv2i\">JT Morris, a senior attorney at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression who is representing Villarreal’s appeal, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the appellate court decided to rehear the case “en banc,” meaning that the entire bench of active judges for the court reheard the case.</p><p data-block-key=\"dh2q2\">Arguments before the judges were held in January 2023, Morris said, and the court’s ruling is now pending.</p></div>",
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"state": {
"name": "Texas",
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},
"updates": [
"(2024-01-23 12:02:00+00:00) Divided federal appeals court won’t revive Texas journalist’s lawsuit",
"(2024-10-15 17:14:00+00:00) Supreme Court revives Texas journalist’s arrest-related lawsuit",
"(2025-04-08 00:00:00+00:00) Appeals court again dismisses Texas journalist’s arrest-related lawsuit"
],
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{
"title": "Filmmaker sues St. Louis police for assault, arrest while covering protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/filmmaker-sues-st-louis-police-assault-arrest-while-covering-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2020-01-27T17:20:59.306086Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T22:57:28.900549Z",
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"date": "2017-09-17",
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"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"5co2b\">According to a lawsuit filed on his behalf, documentary filmmaker Fareed Alston was assaulted, arrested and his equipment damaged while documenting protests in St. Louis, Missouri, on Sept. 17, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"gv5ur\"><a href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">The St. Louis Post-Dispatch</a> reported that more than 1,000 people had gathered in downtown St. Louis to protest the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"xauox\">That night, police officers advanced around the intersection of Washington Avenue and Tucker Boulevard, boxing in approximately 100 people for arrest or detention in <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/journalists-covering-protests-us-risk-getting-caught-police-kettling-tactic/\">a maneuver called kettling</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"lzxt7\">On Sept. 17, 2018, one year after the kettling arrests, ArchCity Defenders, a legal advocacy organization, and the law firm of Khazaeli Wyrsch <a href=\"https://www.archcitydefenders.org/on-the-anniversary-of-the-unlawful-police-kettling-archcity-defenders-and-the-law-firm-of-khazaeli-wyrsch-file-twelve-federal-lawsuits-against-st-louis-city-and-the-st-louis-metropolitan-police-dep-2/\">filed 12 lawsuits</a> against the St. Louis Metro Police Department on behalf of individuals whom they said were treated illegally by police officers during the protests. Alston and two freelance video journalists, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-filmmaker-pepper-sprayed-arrested-st-louis-protests/\">Mark Gullet</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-video-journalist-assaulted-arrested-st-louis-protests/\">Demetrius Thomas</a>, were among those represented.</p><p data-block-key=\"ywyv9\">According to the lawsuit filed on Alston’s behalf, Alston arrived in downtown St. Louis with his assistant between 9 – 10:30 p.m. CST on Sept. 17. Both were carrying official press passes and cameras for the purpose of documenting the protest.</p><p data-block-key=\"23hfx\">Though many of the protesters had already dispersed, a small group was standing on the side of Washington Avenue. The lawsuit says that Alston also saw approximately 50 to 100 St. Louis police officers dressed in riot gear, so he and his assistant split up and began filming. According to the complaint, officers did not indicate that the filmmakers should not enter the area or that a mass arrest was imminent.</p><p data-block-key=\"h6512\">Shortly after, a line of police started advancing toward the demonstrators. According to the complaint, an apartment tenant allowed Alston’s assistant to enter the building and escape the marching line of police, but Alston was unable to do the same. Alston then noticed a second line of police approaching from the opposite direction, beginning to box in all those present while pounding their batons against their shields and the ground.</p><p data-block-key=\"lnafk\">While continuing to film, Alston and a few other people approached the line of bicycle police who made up one side of the kettle so they could ask to leave. As they neared, the complaint says, the officers started “slamming” their bicycles on the ground. Alston searched for another exit, but finding none he re-approached a bicycle officer to ask to be let out.</p><p data-block-key=\"4nrrd\">“Without warning or any verbal directions, the police officer pushed Mr. Alston back with his baton and his shield and started to fire pepper spray directly at Mr. Alston’s face,” the complaint says. “At the same time, a second officer began to pepper spray Mr. Alston.”</p><p data-block-key=\"hfg22\">Alston and others around him fell to the ground, and were quickly surrounded by police. According to the complaint, a number of officers began kicking Alston while continuing to douse him in pepper spray for several minutes.</p><p data-block-key=\"ik323\">Officers then turned Alston over and cuffed him with three zip ties, causing immediate pain. Another officer roughly pulled the camera from around Alston’s neck, “slammed” it on the ground and powered it off.</p><p data-block-key=\"jeccy\">The lawsuit says that at one point an officer began to taunt Alston.</p><p data-block-key=\"g0rne\">“The officer said that this is what Mr. Alston got for wanting to videotape the police. Other officers also told Mr. Alston not to record what was happening. It was clear that Mr. Alston was targeted for documenting the protest,” the complaint says.</p><p data-block-key=\"d6747\">Alston was taken to St. Louis City Justice Center alongside others arrested at the scene, where he was incarcerated for nearly 24 hours and received minimal medical attention. His camera was returned to him upon his release, but it had been badly damaged and pieces of his lighting equipment — including a lighting fixture and its power source — were lost when he was roughly cuffed.</p><p data-block-key=\"8gopa\">According to the complaint, Alston continues to suffer physical and psychological repercussions from his arrest and assault, including persistent numbness in his hand, chronic respiratory issues and nightmares. He also no longer feels comfortable covering protests, which had been the main subject of his work.</p><p data-block-key=\"vbe2v\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2017-09-16&date_upper=2017-09-18&tags=52\">10 journalists</a> detained, arrested, assaulted or had their equipment damaged while covering the protests that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"g6j7o\">Alston, Thomas, Gullet and the other plaintiffs are seeking damages, attorneys fees, expenses and any other relief the court deems appropriate. Alston’s case is not expected to go to trial until early 2021.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"78xqn\">Around 100 demonstrators and multiple journalists were pepper-sprayed and arrested during protests following a not guilty verdict in the murder trial of a former St. Louis, Missouri, police officer on Sept. 17, 2017.</p>",
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": true,
"case_number": "4:19-cv-02590",
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"status_of_seized_equipment": "returned in part",
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"actor": "law enforcement",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
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{
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"equipment": "camera"
},
{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera equipment"
},
{
"quantity": 1,
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}
],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
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},
"updates": [
"(2023-08-03 13:31:00+00:00) Filmmaker gets part of $4.9 million class-action settlement"
],
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"settled"
],
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
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"targeted_journalists": [
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],
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},
{
"title": "Independent video journalist assaulted, arrested in St. Louis protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-video-journalist-assaulted-arrested-st-louis-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2020-01-27T17:24:18.063629Z",
"last_published_at": "2023-10-27T21:17:42.041017Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2023-10-27T21:17:41.906644Z",
"date": "2017-09-17",
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"city": "St. Louis",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"phyn8\">According to a lawsuit filed on his behalf, freelance video journalist Demetrius Thomas was assaulted, arrested and his equipment damaged while documenting protests in St. Louis, Missouri, on Sept. 17, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"bz272\"><a href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">The St. Louis Post-Dispatch</a> reported that more than 1,000 people had gathered in downtown St. Louis to protest the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"il3g3\">That night, police officers advanced around the intersection of Washington Avenue and Tucker Boulevard, boxing in approximately 100 people for arrest or detention in <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/journalists-covering-protests-us-risk-getting-caught-police-kettling-tactic/\">a maneuver called kettling</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"4o2tg\">On Sept. 17, 2018, one year after the kettling arrests, ArchCity Defenders, a legal advocacy organization, and the law firm of Khazaeli Wyrsch <a href=\"https://www.archcitydefenders.org/on-the-anniversary-of-the-unlawful-police-kettling-archcity-defenders-and-the-law-firm-of-khazaeli-wyrsch-file-twelve-federal-lawsuits-against-st-louis-city-and-the-st-louis-metropolitan-police-dep-2/\">filed 12 lawsuits</a> against the St. Louis Metro Police Department on behalf of individuals whom they said were treated illegally by police officers during the protests. Thomas and two freelance filmmakers, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-filmmaker-pepper-sprayed-arrested-st-louis-protests/\">Mark Gullet</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/filmmaker-sues-st-louis-police-assault-arrest-while-covering-protest/\">Fareed Alston</a>, were among those represented.</p><p data-block-key=\"qya0r\">According to the lawsuit filed on Thomas’ behalf, Thomas drove downtown after receiving a call from a friend telling him about the protests, but by the time he arrived they had all but ended. He parked near Tucker Boulevard, where he saw police officers in “military garb” form a line and begin chanting loudly.</p><p data-block-key=\"d6ej9\">While filming the police, Thomas changed his position to get a better angle. According to the complaint, an officer approached Thomas and told him that he could record as long as he remained on the sidewalk. He complied and rejoined other members of the media on a sidewalk corner.</p><p data-block-key=\"8oiq4\">The lawsuit says that Thomas noticed a change in the officers’ attitudes and that they appeared to be preparing to kettle and arrest all those present, so Thomas attempted to leave the scene via a nearby alley. A police officer blocked his path and directed him back towards the intersection. Thomas complied.</p><p data-block-key=\"b1oqh\">At the intersection, Thomas saw between 100 to 200 officers pounding their batons against their shields and the ground. According to the complaint, Thomas was terrified and attempted to return to his car parked past the intersection. Officers blocked him once again.</p><p data-block-key=\"gxu1u\">“In response to Mr. Thomas’s plea, an SLMPD officer pointed a large can of pepper spray at Mr. Thomas and told him to ‘get out of here’,” the complaint says. Thomas complied, and followed the officer’s directions to return to the intersection. There, the crowd was pushed by police and Thomas was knocked to the ground. Suddenly and without warning, police began indiscriminately pepper spraying the kettled crowd.</p><p data-block-key=\"2xddf\">According to the complaint, when police advanced into the crowd to arrest those present, several officers held Thomas by the arms and legs while another struck him repeatedly in the ribs with his baton. Another officer confiscated Mr. Thomas’s camera, and in the altercation officers broke Thomas’ drone.</p><p data-block-key=\"80305\">Thomas was zip tied and taken to St. Louis City Justice Center alongside others arrested at the scene, where he was detained for several hours.</p><p data-block-key=\"c9kpn\">“I was strictly there to film and document that night because it’s a part of history. Instead we were kettled, beat, and arrested — there was nowhere to turn, and you couldn’t call the police because they were the ones doing it to you,” Thomas said, <a href=\"https://www.archcitydefenders.org/on-the-anniversary-of-the-unlawful-police-kettling-archcity-defenders-and-the-law-firm-of-khazaeli-wyrsch-file-twelve-federal-lawsuits-against-st-louis-city-and-the-st-louis-metropolitan-police-dep-2/\">according to a press release</a> announcing the lawsuits. Thomas also said that the damage to his camera equipment cost him several job opportunities, making it impossible for him to keep up with house payments.</p><p data-block-key=\"ok28f\">In <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wzy7pH6JsMI\">a video</a> posted on ArchCity Defenders’ YouTube, Thomas said the events are something he’ll never forget.</p><p data-block-key=\"7jywl\">“For it to end up the way that it ended up kind of damaged my whole outlook on trying to capture real life events like that, because it could always take a turn for the worse,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"sxols\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2017-09-16&date_upper=2017-09-18&tags=52\">10 journalists</a> detained, arrested, assaulted or had their equipment damaged while covering the protests that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"obdf4\">Thomas, Gullet, Alston and the other plaintiffs are seeking damages, attorneys fees, expenses and any other relief the court deems appropriate. Thomas’ case is not expected to go to trial until April 2021.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"610d6\">Police corner and detain protesters on the street following the not guilty verdict in the murder trial of a former St. Louis, Missouri, police officer on Sept. 17, 2017. Multiple journalists were arrested in the kettle.</p>",
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"(2023-08-03 13:32:00+00:00) Video journalist gets part of $4.9 million class-action settlement"
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{
"title": "Independent filmmaker pepper-sprayed, arrested in St. Louis protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-filmmaker-pepper-sprayed-arrested-st-louis-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2020-01-27T17:22:34.337149Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T23:39:05.940864Z",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"8w24c\">In a lawsuit filed on his behalf, freelance filmmaker Mark Gullet says he was assaulted and arrested by police officers in St. Louis, Missouri, on Sept. 17, 2017, while recording footage of a protest for his film on crime.</p><p data-block-key=\"qbs0y\"><a href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">The St. Louis Post-Dispatch</a> reported that more than 1,000 people had gathered in downtown St. Louis that day to protest the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"o4ge1\">The Post-Dispatch <a href=\"https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/undercover-cop-air-force-officer-med-student-among-those-police/article_e2dcc3de-f228-5311-a35f-e60e1bd9ebee.html\">reported</a> that Gullet said he arrived downtown around 11 p.m., “after all the vandalism had happened.”</p><p data-block-key=\"zdd6l\">“I was on the sidelines with other media. Out of nowhere, we hear marching and batons hitting shields,” Gullet told the Post-Dispatch.</p><p data-block-key=\"qcoo7\">Three lines of police in riot gear and one of bicycle officers advanced around the intersection of Washington Avenue and Tucker Boulevard, boxing in approximately 100 people for arrest or detention in <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/journalists-covering-protests-us-risk-getting-caught-police-kettling-tactic/\">a maneuver called kettling</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"nn8vm\">According to the lawsuit filed on Gullet’s behalf, Gullet saw the bicycle officers approaching and asked them if he could leave. The lawsuit says the officers wouldn’t allow him to pass, and instead pushed their bicycles towards him and told him to get back. Trapped in the kettle, Gullet got on his knees on his own volition.</p><p data-block-key=\"ysn1w\">“At this point, Mr. Gullet observed officers unleash pepper spray without warning,” the lawsuit states. “Also without warning, a police officer grabbed Mr. Gullet’s arms so forcefully that Mr. Gullet thought his right shoulder was going to pop out. The officer then restrained Mr. Gullet’s hands with zip ties and pepper sprayed him directly in the face.”</p><p data-block-key=\"4iu8o\">Gullet was taken to St. Louis City Justice Center alongside others arrested at the scene, where he was jailed for approximately 20 hours without receiving medical attention, the lawsuit states.</p><p data-block-key=\"tg6fg\">On Sept. 17, 2018, one year after the kettling arrests, ArchCity Defenders, a legal advocacy group, and the law firm of Khazaeli Wyrsch <a href=\"https://www.archcitydefenders.org/on-the-anniversary-of-the-unlawful-police-kettling-archcity-defenders-and-the-law-firm-of-khazaeli-wyrsch-file-twelve-federal-lawsuits-against-st-louis-city-and-the-st-louis-metropolitan-police-dep-2/\">filed 12 lawsuits</a> against the St. Louis Metro Police Department on behalf of individuals whom they said were treated illegally by police officers during the protests. Gullet and two video journalists, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/filmmaker-sues-st-louis-police-assault-arrest-while-covering-protest/\">Fareed Alston</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-video-journalist-assaulted-arrested-st-louis-protests/\">Demetrius Thomas</a>, were among those represented.</p><p data-block-key=\"j9bxq\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2017-09-16&date_upper=2017-09-18&tags=52\">10 journalists</a> detained, arrested, assaulted or had their equipment damaged while covering the protests that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"ss03t\">Gullet, Thomas, Alston and the other plaintiffs are seeking damages, attorneys fees, expenses and any other relief the court deems appropriate. A trial for Gullet’s case has not been scheduled.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/RTX3GQUZ.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"e2ijv\">Around 100 demonstrators and multiple journalists were arrested during protests following a verdict of not guilty in the murder trial of a former St. Louis, Missouri, police officer on Sept. 17, 2017.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
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"name": "Missouri",
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"(2023-08-03 13:29:00+00:00) Filmmaker gets part of $4.9 million class-action settlement"
],
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"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
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"categories": [
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{
"title": "Getty photographer arrested while covering protest in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/getty-photographer-arrested-while-covering-protest-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-09-22T02:13:59.625024Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-04-16T18:43:41.973748Z",
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"date": "2017-09-17",
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"city": "St. Louis",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"dwmyk\">Getty photographer Scott Olson was arrested while covering a protest in St. Louis on Sept. 17, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"jl6o0\">That night, hundreds of people gathered in downtown St. Louis to protest the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"k8quv\">Olson told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that more than a hundred St. Louis police officers converged from all sides on the intersection of Washington Street and Tucker Boulevard, where a crowd of people had gathered. He described the crowd as a mix of a few activists, some journalists and many bystanders. He said that the police ordered everyone to disperse while simultaneously cutting off their exits and then ordered everyone to lie down on the ground and started to arrest them.</p><p data-block-key=\"7ni2r\">“They did it kind of violently,” he said. “A lot of people were pepper sprayed or Maced while they were still on the ground.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2n572\">He said that he was not pepper sprayed by police officers, which he attributes to his use of a gas mask.</p><p data-block-key=\"f739c\">“One of the reasons I may not have been pepper sprayed before my arrest is that it wouldn’t have had much effect,” he said. “I’m pretty sure I was wearing my gas mask because I was anticipating the use of mace or pepper spray. During the protest, I was wearing body armor, a bump cap, mil-spec eye protection and carrying/using a gas mask. Unfortunately, most of this protective gear is used to protect me from police tactics, not those of protesters.”</p><p data-block-key=\"msidb\">Although police did not pepper spray him, he said that that police did forcefully push him to the ground.</p><p data-block-key=\"kqpcm\">“I was holding my cameras, they told me to put them down, I didn’t do that, so I just took a knee, and then they forced me all the way down and then zip-tied me,” he said. “They were telling me to drop my cameras. They would not let me take my camera.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fg0j1\">According to Olson, one officer said “Fuck your camera!” after he asked to take it with him.</p><p data-block-key=\"vgjm3\">A spokeswoman for the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that no journalists have filed formal complaints alleging police misconduct.</p><p data-block-key=\"51pfz\">“We hold our officers to the highest standards of professionalism and any officer not meeting those standards will be held accountable,” she said. “No members of the media have contacted the Internal Affairs Division to make a formal complaint. If anyone would like to make a complaint of officer misconduct, they should contact our Internal Affairs Division via our website (slmpd.org) phone (444-5652) or in person at Police Headquarters, 1915 Olive.”</p><p data-block-key=\"t13l3\">Olson said that he was <a href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/18/ferguson-police-arrest-photographer-scott-olsen\">arrested</a> and taken to jail, where he was held for around 12 hours and then released on $50 bail. He said that the police returned his cameras to him when he was released and he does not believe that they were searched.</p><p data-block-key=\"v8ah8\">Before the arrest in St. Louis on Sept. 17, Olson said, he had only been arrested once in the course of his roughly 30 years as a photojournalist. His first arrest occurred in 2014, when he was covering protests in neighboring Ferguson, Missouri.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"jvi5o\">Scott Olson, a Getty photographer, was arrested by St. Louis police on September 17, 2017, shortly after taking this photograph of police arresting demonstrators.</p>",
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"(2018-09-17 00:00:00+00:00) Charges dropped against Getty photographer"
],
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{
"title": "Fusion video journalist pushed into wall and detained by St. Louis police",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/fusion-video-journalist-pushed-wall-and-detained-st-louis-police/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-12T08:02:43.223742Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-04-16T18:44:32.787265Z",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"so76v\">Chris Burke — a videographer working for Fusion — was forcibly pushed into a wall, handcuffed, and detained by police while covering protests in St. Louis, Missouri, on Sept. 17, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"v9tnw\">The protest was a response to the acquittal in September of of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"5zez7\">Burke told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that he was part of a group of photojournalists who were moving alongside demonstrators as they marched in downtown St. Louis on Sept. 17.</p><p data-block-key=\"aabmd\">“We were obviously journalists”, Burke said, adding that the group was easily identifiable as press because many of them wore press badges and carried cameras and video equipment.</p><p data-block-key=\"dl3gv\">Burke said the police presence swelled in size as the demonstrators moved away from downtown St. Louis. When the march turned a corner, he said, police drove an unmarked van into the crowd and began shooting pepper spray balls at the crowd.</p><p data-block-key=\"vri1o\">“They pepper balled journalists as well as protesters,” Burke said.</p><p data-block-key=\"l5moq\">Burke said that he was not hit by any of the balls, but he saw <a href=\"https://www.columbiamissourian.com/from_the_newsroom/commentary-police-posed-a-greater-danger-to-journalists-than-demonstrators/article_27e06384-a063-11e7-b27b-77c18c5bce7d.html\">several journalists</a> who were.</p><p data-block-key=\"adj2m\">Burke said that he was later detained along with another photojournalist, Davis Winborne, after police enclosed a group of demonstrators and journalists. Burke said that police let some journalists leave the area but pushed him and Winborne into a brick wall.</p><p data-block-key=\"j7d8m\">Burke said that he felt one officer press his thumb behind his jawline.</p><p data-block-key=\"chx2x\">“It seemed like he was trying to find a pressure point,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"gfeyw\">Burke said that, when he asked the officer to remove his hand from his jaw, the officer ordered him to put his hands behind his back and handcuffed him. He also said that police used aggressive and profane language, calling Burke and Winborne “bitches.”</p><p data-block-key=\"r2c6z\">According to Burke, he and several journalists were loaded into a police van and detained for about 30 minutes.</p><p data-block-key=\"kfsjs\">“They never read us our rights, and it seemed like the police were trying to scare us,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"3txrl\">Burke said that he was eventually released after another photojournalist, Marcus DiPaola, was vouched for his identity. Burke also said that a police officer apologized to him after he was released.</p><p data-block-key=\"ewo0f\">Burke told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that the tactics used by the St. Louis police on September 17 seemed “pretty aggressive,” relative to previous protests that he has covered in other cities.</p><p data-block-key=\"dvxru\">“They felt like scare tactics, to make sure media doesn’t get in the way anymore,” he said.</p></div>",
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"tags": [
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"categories": [
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{
"title": "Filmmaker Jennifer Burbridge pepper sprayed and arrested by St. Louis police",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/filmmaker-jennifer-burbridge-pepper-sprayed-arrested-st-louis-police/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-06T08:09:08.023026Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T22:35:38.127127Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-03T22:35:38.016710Z",
"date": "2017-09-17",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ocaj2\">Jennifer Burbridge was arrested while filming protests in St. Louis, Missouri on Sept. 17, 2017, according to a federal lawsuit that she and her husband, Drew, filed against the city. Both Jennifer and Drew are documentary filmmakers.</p><p data-block-key=\"8ckve\">The lawsuit was <a href=\"https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-courts/filmmakers-sue-st-louis-police-for-arrest-in-kettle/article_7e3abf60-67e4-54c6-b7cd-a584eeded886.html\">filed</a> in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri on Sept. 26 and accuses St. Louis police officers (referred to as “John Does”) of violating their First Amendment rights.</p><p data-block-key=\"g15fk\">The <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/documents/2/Burbridge_complaint.pdf\">complaint</a> states that Jennifer and her husband were filming protests in downtown St. Louis on Sept. 17 when they — along with protesters and other journalists — were enclosed by police in a “kettle” at the intersection of Tucker Boulevard and Washington Ave.</p><p data-block-key=\"pbzzg\">The complaint describes what happened next to Jennifer Burbridge:</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-blockquote\">\n\n<blockquote class=\"blockquote\" cite=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/documents/2/Burbridge_complaint.pdf\">\n\t<div class=\"rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"zzcg5\">Jennifer Burbridge was among those who were initially indirectly subjected to chemical spray by the police.</p><p data-block-key=\"cokur\">Jennifer Burbridge was forced to watch her husband and film partner Drew Burbridge being drug away by Defendants John Does #1, #2 and #3.</p><p data-block-key=\"u7cjr\">She was physically prevented from following or assisting her husband.</p><p data-block-key=\"jgjqr\">She observed the law enforcement assault and beating of her husband.</p><p data-block-key=\"a0obs\">At one point, while two officers were carrying Jennifer Burbridge away, one of the officers passed another male officer and stated, “Look who I have.” Such statements illustrated a clear intent on the part of the officers to target members of the media, like the Burbridges, who were attempting to document the protests and the SLMPD police response.</p><p data-block-key=\"hy0u2\">Another SLMPD officer made a point to walk up to Jennifer Burbridge after she had observed her husband pepper sprayed and assaulted and exclaim, “Did you like that? Come back tomorrow and we can do this again.” Another SLMPD officer stated, “What did you think was going to happen?”</p><p data-block-key=\"8kodu\">Like her husband, Jennifer Burbridge was taken into custody of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department who placed her in a van for transport to jail.</p><p data-block-key=\"tkpko\">On the way to the jail, a detainee in the van requested the name of the transporting officers, one of who responded, “I’m Father Time.”</p><p data-block-key=\"htts7\">Jennifer Burbridge was jailed for nearly 20-hours.</p><p data-block-key=\"ue03e\">Jennifer Burbridge was required to submit to a jail administered pregnancy test as a condition of being released.</p><p data-block-key=\"6zn6e\">Jennifer Burbridge was release with a municipal charge of “failure to disperse.”</p></div>\n\t\n\t\t<cite class=\"blockquote__citation\">\n\t\t\t<a class=\"blockquote__link text-link\" href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/documents/2/Burbridge_complaint.pdf\">\n\t\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"synvz\">Complaint for damages</p>\n\t\t\t</a>\n\t\t</cite>\n\t\n</blockquote>\n</div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-10-06_at_4.33.55.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-09-18",
"detention_date": "2017-09-17",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": true,
"case_number": "4:17-cv-02482",
"case_type": "CIVIL",
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
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"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "no",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2021-11-19 00:00:00+00:00) City of St. Louis agrees to pay deceased filmmaker $115k to settle lawsuit",
"(2019-04-15 00:00:00+00:00) Charges dropped against filmmaker Jennifer Burbridge"
],
"case_statuses": [
"settled"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Jennifer Burbridge (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Filmmaker Drew Burbridge beaten, pepper sprayed and arrested by St. Louis police",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/filmmaker-drew-burbridge-beaten-pepper-sprayed-and-arrested-st-louis-police/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-06T08:03:15.085973Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T23:47:03.589240Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-03T23:47:03.492473Z",
"date": "2017-09-17",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"3wh26\">Drew Burbridge and his wife, Jennifer, were assaulted and arrested while filming protests in St. Louis, Missouri on Sept. 17, 2017, according to a federal lawsuit that the two of them filed against the city. Both Drew and Jennifer are documentary filmmakers.</p><p data-block-key=\"voppi\">The lawsuit was <a href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/filmmakers-sue-st-louis-police-for-arrest-in-kettle/article_7e3abf60-67e4-54c6-b7cd-a584eeded886.html\">filed</a> in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri on Sept. 26 and accuses St. Louis police officers (referred to as “John Does”) of violating their First Amendment rights.</p><p data-block-key=\"v55mt\">The <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/documents/2/Burbridge_complaint.pdf\">complaint</a> states that Drew and Jennifer Burbridge were filming protests in downtown St. Louis on Sept. 17 when they — along with protesters and other journalists — were enclosed by police in a “kettle” at the intersection of Tucker Boulevard and Washington Ave.</p><p data-block-key=\"f5784\">The complaint describes what happened next to Drew Burbridge:</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-blockquote\">\n\n<blockquote class=\"blockquote\" cite=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/documents/2/Burbridge_complaint.pdf\">\n\t<div class=\"rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"xiaex\">After the initial deployment of chemical agents by the police, Drew Burbridge, who was sitting cross legged on the ground with his arms around his wife, was approached by two St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department officers, Defendants John Doe #1 and John Doe #2, in full riot gear.</p><p data-block-key=\"t525f\">One of the two officers (John Doe #1) stated “that’s him” and grabbed Drew Burbridge by each arm and roughly drug him away from his wife.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"ujpeh\">Drew Burbridge immediately identified himself to the Defendants as a journalist and specifically stated that he was not a protester, not resisting arrest, and was part of the media.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"02czd\">Defendants John Doe #1 and Defendant John Doe #2 then purposely deployed chemical spray into his mouth and eyes and ripped his camera from his neck.</p><p data-block-key=\"gzna0\">At the time Defendants John Doe #1 and #2 purposely sprayed chemical spray into Drew Burbridges mouth and eyes, Drew Burbridge was not resisting and was willing and ready to comply with any order given by the Defendants.</p><p data-block-key=\"lprxy\">John Doe #1 and #2 threw Drew Burbridge to the pavement, face first, and twisted his arms behind his back, and repeatedly kicked Drew Burbridge in the back while restraining his arms behind his back with zip-ties. During this entire time, Plaintiff was submissive and complying with the officers.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"jf54h\">After Drew Burbridges hand were restrained behind his back and while on the ground, SLMPD officers Defendants John Does #1, 2, and 3, then proceeded to strike him on the ankles, legs, body, and head, with their feet, hands, and batons.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"boi7g\">While beating Drew Burbridge, one of the John Doe Defendants stated: “Do you want to take my picture now motherfucker? Do you want me to pose for you?”<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"hb2rb\">At no point during the illegal beating was Drew Burbridge resisting or in any other way failing to comply with the officers, and his hands were zip-tied behind his back during the beating.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"zbiuz\">Defendants continued to beat and pepper spray Drew Burbridge until he lost consciousness from the sustained beating. He awoke to an officer pulling his head up by his hair and spraying him with chemical agents in the face.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"w83ei\">Despite repeated requests by Drew Burbridge, none of the law enforcement officers would identify themselves. All of the law enforcement officers involved had removed their name identifications.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"pf5f0\">Drew Burbridge was transferred to the custody of a uniformed SLMPD officer who placed him in a van for transport to jail.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"xu29g\">Although he had been pepper-sprayed and beaten and could not see, the SLMPD officers did not allow or assist Drew Burbridge in rinsing the chemical agent from his eyes and would laugh as he stumbled and ran into objects as he tried to make his way into the van and jail.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"1mthi\">Drew Burbridge was jailed for nearly 20-hours.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"jbeir\">Drew Burbridge was released with a municipal charge of “failure to disperse.”</p></div>\n\t\n\t\t<cite class=\"blockquote__citation\">\n\t\t\t<a class=\"blockquote__link text-link\" href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/documents/2/Burbridge_complaint.pdf\">\n\t\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"8pypk\">Complaint for damages</p>\n\t\t\t</a>\n\t\t</cite>\n\t\n</blockquote>\n</div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-10-06_at_4.31.03.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-09-18",
"detention_date": "2017-09-17",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": true,
"case_number": "4:17-cv-02482",
"case_type": "CIVIL",
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2019-04-15 00:00:00+00:00) Charges dropped against filmmaker Drew Burbridge",
"(2021-11-19 00:00:00+00:00) City of St. Louis agrees to pay deceased filmmaker $115k to settle lawsuit"
],
"case_statuses": [
"settled"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Drew Burbridge (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
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},
{
"title": "St. Louis police shoot University of Missouri student journalist with pepper balls",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/st-louis-police-shoot-university-missouri-student-journalist-pepper-balls/",
"first_published_at": "2017-10-12T01:00:52.872925Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-03-20T20:16:59.044542Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-03-20T20:16:58.947192Z",
"date": "2017-09-17",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"k8ssy\">Davis Winborne — a photojournalism student at the University of Missouri — reported that he was hit by pepper spray balls, choked, handcuffed and loaded into a van by St. Louis Police while covering a protest in St. Louis, Missouri, on Sept. 17, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"fzwws\">The protest was a response to the acquittal in Sept. of of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"wo0p4\">The Columbia Missourian published <a href=\"https://www.columbiamissourian.com/from_the_newsroom/commentary-police-posed-a-greater-danger-to-journalists-than-demonstrators/article_27e06384-a063-11e7-b27b-77c18c5bce7d.html\">Winborne’s first-person account</a> of covering the protest.</p><p data-block-key=\"k7bls\">Winborne writes that he was part of a larger group of photojournalists, many of whom were carrying professional equipment and wearing press badges, who were covering the protest march.</p><p data-block-key=\"7ffp0\">Winborne says that police officers chased the crowd of protesters and journalists and fired beanbag rounds at them. A different group of police officers then drove toward the crowd in an unmarked Jeep and indiscriminately pepper sprayed both protesters and journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"v35ty\">When the group of protesters and journalists reached the intersection of Tucker St. and Olive St., Winborne says, a SWAT truck pulled up next to the crowd and officers inside the truck fired pepper spray paintballs at the protesters and journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"jxb7h\">Winborne reported that he was hit twice by the pepper balls.</p><p data-block-key=\"aapge\">According to Winborne, a number of SWAT officers exited the SWAT vehicle and began grabbing journalists and protesters. Winborne writes that a SWAT officer grabbed him by the neck, pushed him into a brick wall and then zip-tied him. Winborne says that an officer removed his respirator and pulled back his helmet, which caused his helmet strap to choke him.</p><p data-block-key=\"unych\">Winborne writes that Chris Burke, a photographer, told the officer, “You need to take off his helmet, he’s choking.” According to Winborne, the officer just said, “I can’t hear you” and walked away.</p><p data-block-key=\"eqn8k\">Winborne says that when he asked one officer whether he was under arrest, the officer replied, “Shut up, motherfucker.” Winborne says that another officer told the group of journalists, “All of you dumbasses are going to jail tonight.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9qwyi\">Winborne says that the group of zip-tied journalists and demonstrators was loaded into the back of a police van and left there for about a half hour before being released.</p><p data-block-key=\"41aih\">Winborne said that he was later told that a freelance photographer persuaded the police to release the group on the grounds that they were journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"5sq1t\">Winborne sharply criticized the behavior of the St. Louis police.</p><p data-block-key=\"9m98m\">“When police ignore the people who are smashing windows and destroying property in order to focus on handcuffing and berating journalists, it impedes our ability to show the world what is happening,” he wrote in the Missourian.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/DavisWinborne.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"o42xr\">Davis Winborne</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "no",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"court verdict",
"protest",
"shot / shot at",
"student journalism"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Davis Winborne (Columbia Missourian)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Independent livestreamer Jon Ziegler pepper-sprayed and arrested in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-livestreamer-jon-ziegler-pepper-sprayed-and-arrested-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-09-21T23:04:24.900549Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T20:58:13.970071Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-03T20:58:13.852242Z",
"date": "2017-09-17",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"kn57n\">Jon Ziegler, an independent livestreamer also known as “Rebelutionary Z,” was pepper sprayed and arrested on Sept. 17, 2017, while covering a protest in St. Louis, Missouri.</p><p data-block-key=\"iel7x\">On Sunday night, hundreds of people gathered in downtown St. Louis to protest the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"pxtkb\">Around 11 p.m., large groups of St. Louis metropolitan police officers boxed in about a hundred people at the intersection of Washington Street and Tucker Boulevard and ordered them to get on the ground, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch <a href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">reported</a>. Ziegler was among those caught in the kettle. At the time, he was carrying a camera and an iPhone on a tripod.</p><p data-block-key=\"xj65h\">Ziegler told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that police officers repeatedly doused him and other journalists and protesters in the kettle with pepper spray.</p><p data-block-key=\"xq2pp\">“I was drenched in spray” he said. “I remember my tripod looking like it had rained on it.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6z60x\">He said that while he lay on the ground, one officer sprayed pepper spray directly at his mouth and others physically assaulted him.</p><p data-block-key=\"foyqx\">“I start feeling jabs in my back,” he said. “All of a sudden, I feel a foot or a knee on the back of my head just pushing it into the concrete and grinding it into the concrete.”</p><p data-block-key=\"020if\">Ziegler said that police officers celebrated after arresting everyone in the kettle, smoking cigars and mocking the journalists, protesters and legal observers who had been arrested. A bystander interviewed by NPR also claimed that officers smoked cigars and mocked protesters after making arrests. Post-Dispatch photojournalist David Carson <a href=\"https://twitter.com/PDPJ/status/909678305640685568\">tweeted</a> a video on which officers can be heard chanting, “Whose Streets? Our Streets,” in mockery of protesters.</p><p data-block-key=\"s189g\">Asked about the video, a police department spokeswoman told <a href=\"https://www.reuters.com/article/us-missouri-crime/st-louis-police-probe-whether-officers-chanted-whose-streets-our-streets-idUSKCN1BT1YC\">Reuters</a>: “The Department is aware of the video circulating on social media, and is reviewing the footage. We hold our officers to the highest standards of professionalism and any officer not meeting those standards will be held accountable.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6r07s\">Ziegler said that officers specifically alluded to and mocked his journalistic work while arresting him, repeatedly calling him “superstar” and taking selfies with him. He said that the officer who arrested him joked that he was his “biggest fan” and bragged that he watched all of his livestreams.</p><p data-block-key=\"er6wb\">“They were quoting back my tweets to me and quoting back parts of the stream,” he said. “That kind of joking and sarcastic behavior continued inside the precinct with some of the officers.”</p><p data-block-key=\"n064w\">Like others <a href=\"http://wxxinews.org/post/st-louis-edge-protesters-expected-gather-again\">arrested</a> in the kettle, Ziegler was taken to a nearby jail. He said that he was held for more than 12 hours, before finally being released on a $50 bond.</p><p data-block-key=\"i7h9g\">Ziegler’s <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlUX1HrV9p8&t=42m\">livestream</a> from Sept. 17 shows police officers surrounding the protesters from all sides and pepper spraying them.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-video\">\n\n<figure class=\"inline-media full-width\">\n <div style=\"padding-bottom: 56.25%;\" class=\"responsive-object\">\n <iframe width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/UlUX1HrV9p8?start=2520&feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen></iframe>\n</div>\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n \n <p data-block-key=\"mfiz0\">Jon Ziegler's livestream of the arrests</p>\n \n \n <p>Rebelutionary Z</p>\n \n </figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"wfhto\">“They maced me for having my camera going,” Ziegler says on the livestream at one point. “We’re all just choking on mace now. We’re drowning in mace here.”</p><p data-block-key=\"logil\">Later in the stream, officers approach Ziegler to handcuff and arrest him. One person offscreen calls him “superstar.”</p><p data-block-key=\"1as22\">“You heard them call me superstar on camera, guys,” Ziegler says. “They’re putting on the cuffs real tight, real fucking right. They’re beating the shit out of me. They’re fucking beating the shit out of me! Stop pushing my head in the ground!”</p><p data-block-key=\"8nw9n\">“Shut up,” someone says offscreen.</p><p data-block-key=\"291t6\">“They’re pushing my head in the ground, real tight.” Ziegler says, just before screaming out in pain. “Fuck, they sprayed me again!”</p><p data-block-key=\"f05du\">As Ziegler is led away from the scene, an officer approaches his phone and shuts off the livestream.</p><p data-block-key=\"glwub\">A police department spokeswoman told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that no journalist has made a formal complaint of police misconduct.</p><p data-block-key=\"0h5z3\">"We hold our officers to the highest standards of professionalism and any officer not meeting those standards will be held accountable," the spokeswoman said. "No members of the media have contacted the Internal Affairs Division to make a formal complaint. If anyone would like to make a complaint of officer misconduct, they should contact our Internal Affairs Division via our website (slmpd.org) phone (444-5652) or in person at Police Headquarters, 1915 Olive."</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-09-21_at_5.20.59.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"e74he\">Screengrab from Jon Ziegler's livestream shows a police officer pepper-spraying Ziegler before arresting him, in downtown St. Louis, on September 17, 2017.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": true,
"case_number": "4:19-cv-02590",
"case_type": "CLASS_ACTION",
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2023-08-03 00:00:00+00:00) Journalist gets part of $4.9 million class-action settlement",
"(2017-10-01 14:38:00+00:00) Charges against independent livestreamer dropped"
],
"case_statuses": [
"settled"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Jon Ziegler (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter knocked to ground by police and arrested",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/st-louis-post-dispatch-reporter-knocked-ground-police-and-arrested/",
"first_published_at": "2017-09-21T23:01:19.364836Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T23:59:46.981875Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-03T23:59:46.825096Z",
"date": "2017-09-17",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"lnoaj\">St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Mike Faulk was arrested by police on Sept. 17, 2017, while covering a protest in St. Louis, Missouri.</p><p data-block-key=\"5n8og\">According to the Post-Dispatch, more than a thousand people gathered in downtown St. Louis on Sept. 17 to protest the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"d34rb\">Around 11 p.m., large groups of police officers <a href=\"https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">boxed in</a> about a hundred people at the intersection of Washington Street and Tucker Boulevard. Faulk was among those caught in the kettle.</p><p data-block-key=\"c90b2\">The Post-Dispatch reported what happened next:</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-blockquote\">\n\n<blockquote class=\"blockquote\" cite=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">\n\t<div class=\"rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"ao4zx\">St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Mike Faulk was caught in the kettle Sunday night. A line of bike cops formed across Washington Avenue, east of Tucker Boulevard and police in helmets carrying shields and batons blocked the other three sides of the intersection at Tucker and Washington. Faulk heard the repeated police command, “Move back. Move back.” He had nowhere to go.</p><p data-block-key=\"g8e7w\">The police lines moved forward, trapping dozens of people — protesters, journalists, area residents and observers alike. Multiple officers knocked Faulk down, he said, and pinned his limbs to the ground. A firm foot pushed his head into the pavement. Once he was subdued, he recalled, an officer squirted pepper spray in his face.</p><p data-block-key=\"2i5t7\">Police loaded Faulk into a van holding about eight others and took him to the city jail on Tucker, a few blocks to the south. He arrived about midnight and was released about 1:30 p.m. Monday after posting a $50 bond. Faulk was charged with failure to disperse, a municipal charge.</p></div>\n\t\n\t\t<cite class=\"blockquote__citation\">\n\t\t\t<a class=\"blockquote__link text-link\" href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.html\">\n\t\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"ymn3s\">The St. Louis Post-Dispatch</p>\n\t\t\t</a>\n\t\t</cite>\n\t\n</blockquote>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"rjcjd\">Joseph Martineau, an attorney for the Post-Dispatch, wrote a letter to St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewton, Acting Police Chief Lawrence O'Toole, City Counselor Julian Bush and Deputy City Counselor Michael Garvin demanding the city drop all charges against Faulk. The letter details the police's treatment of him:</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-blockquote\">\n\n<blockquote class=\"blockquote\" cite=\"http://www.stltoday.com/post-dispatch-letter-to-mayor-police-chief/pdf_6ad18a13-15ab-5e77-8b54-d1b4b56d6bc2.html\">\n\t<div class=\"rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"ogfhp\">When he was arrested, Mr. Faulk was standing on a sidewalk reporting on the protests. He was not impeding vehicular or pedestrian traffic. He was clearly identified and credentialed as a reporter for the Post-Dispatch and repeatedly advised several of the arresting officers of his status. Nonetheless, he was rounded up and restrained by police officers who surrounded a large group of people and prevented them from leaving the perimeter in a mechanism we understand is referred to as “kettling.” Independent of whether the “kettle” containment activity was proper under the circumstances (and as the Post-Dispatch has reported, there are serious questions about that), there was no reason why a credentialed reporter should have been arrested or restrained from doing his job of reporting the events. Once the reporter was clearly identified as such, he should have been released immediately and allowed to continue his newsgathering activity.</p><p data-block-key=\"xuzjj\">Moreover, as we understand the situation, Mr. Faulk was not merely restrained and arrested. While standing on the sidewalk and making no resistance , he was forcefully pushed to the ground by police officers and a police officer's boot was placed on his head. As a result of this unneeded and inappropriate force, Mr. Faulk suffered injury to both legs, his back and wrist. Even after being restrained with zip ties and totally subdued, a police officer deliberately sprayed him in the face with pepper spray, mace or some other stinging substance. At some point during the evening, an officer also took it upon himself to review the contents of the cellphone Mr. Faulk was using to communicate and photograph the events of the evening. A bike he was using during his news coverage has not been returned to him. He was held for over thirteen hours in jail, even though one of our editors was at the jail only two hours after the arrest to secure his release. That editor was lied to by jail personnel who told her that he was still in transport, even though he was already at the jail. Jail personnel denied his repeated requests for medical attention. </p></div>\n\t\n\t\t<cite class=\"blockquote__citation\">\n\t\t\t<a class=\"blockquote__link text-link\" href=\"http://www.stltoday.com/post-dispatch-letter-to-mayor-police-chief/pdf_6ad18a13-15ab-5e77-8b54-d1b4b56d6bc2.html\">\n\t\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"29tpn\">Post-Dispatch letter to mayor, police chief</p>\n\t\t\t</a>\n\t\t</cite>\n\t\n</blockquote>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"fhpfn\">Faulk was held in jail for 13 hours and then released on a $50 bond on the afternoon of Sept. 18. Once released, he returned to the Post-Dispatch newsroom.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">.<a href=\"https://twitter.com/Mike_Faulk\">@Mike_Faulk</a> returns to newsroom applause after more than 12 hours in jail for doing his job. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/STLVerdict?src=hash\">#STLVerdict</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/cPeKugmiEC\">pic.twitter.com/cPeKugmiEC</a></p>— Christopher Ave (@ChristopherAve) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/ChristopherAve/status/909863679788806144\">September 18, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"3dli3\">“He returned to the newsroom limping, knees bloodied and pepper spray still on his skin,” the Post-Dispatch reported.</p><p data-block-key=\"3yveg\">Post-Dispatch editor Gilbert Bailon <a href=\"https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-courts/post-dispatch-demands-charges-be-dropped-against-reporter-covering-protest/article_bb15e07a-7147-56b3-8629-3ff9ae8eec0d.html\">condemned</a> the police's treatment of Faulk.</p><p data-block-key=\"h16lc\">“St. Louis Post-Dispatch journalists and other credentialed news media provide critical information to the public,” he said in a statement. “When St. Louis police arrested Mike, after he fully identified himself while covering the protests, they violated basic tenets of our democracy. Additionally, the physical abuse he suffered during the arrest is abhorrent and must be investigated. The Post-Dispatch is calling for our city leaders to immediately implement policies that will prevent journalists from being arrested without cause.”</p><p data-block-key=\"xmtq9\">The <a href=\"https://newsguild.org/newsguild-condemns-arrest-of-reporter-michael-faulk/\">News Guild-CWA</a> and the St. Louis chapter of the <a href=\"https://www.ksdk.com/article/news/local/jason-stockley/society-of-professional-journalists-condemns-arrest-of-post-dispatch-reporter/63-477322145\">Society of Professional Journalists</a> also condemned the arrest.</p><p data-block-key=\"59ju1\">“The NewsGuild denounces the arrest of Guild member Michael Faulk and demands that any pending charges against him be dismissed,” Bernie Lunzer, president of The News Guild-CWA, said in a statement. “Faulk was doing his job, informing the people. There is simply no justification for his arrest and mistreatment. There has been a noticeable uptick in assaults and arrests of reporters in recent months. This is a dangerous trend that impedes journalists’ right to report and the people’s right to know.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2drr4\">“Journalism is the only profession protected by name in the Constitution,” St. Louis SPJ chapter president Elizabeth Donald said in a statement. “The First Amendment is not a whimsical academic concept to be dismissed when it becomes inconvenient – or embarrassing to the police. The chilling effect of assaulting, arresting, jailing and charging a journalist in the course of his duties cannot be overstated.”</p><p data-block-key=\"xihwv\">Both The News Guild-CWA and Society of Professional Journalists are partner organizations of the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"m8c57\">A spokeswoman for the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department told the Freedom of the Press Foundation that no journalists have filed formal complaints of police misconduct.</p><p data-block-key=\"tigak\">“We hold our officers to the highest standards of professionalism and any officer not meeting those standards will be held accountable,” she said. “No members of the media have contacted the Internal Affairs Division to make a formal complaint. If anyone would like to make a complaint of officer misconduct, they should contact our Internal Affairs Division via our website (slmpd.org) phone (444-5652) or in person at Police Headquarters, 1915 Olive.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/U438av3O.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"ac7dc\">St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Mike Faulk is arrested while covering a protest in downtown St. Louis on September 17, 2017.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department",
"arrest_status": "arrested and released",
"release_date": "2017-09-18",
"detention_date": "2017-09-17",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": true,
"case_number": "4:19-cv-02590",
"case_type": "CLASS_ACTION",
"status_of_seized_equipment": "returned in part",
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": "law enforcement",
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [
{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "bicycle"
},
{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "cellphone"
}
],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
"updates": [
"(2018-09-17 00:00:00+00:00) Charges dropped against St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter arrested in September 2017",
"(2023-08-21 13:26:00+00:00) Former journalist gets part of $4.9 million class-action settlement",
"(2018-02-23 12:00:00+00:00) Mike Faulk sues St. Louis police"
],
"case_statuses": [
"settled"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"court verdict",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault",
"Equipment Search or Seizure"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
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],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist, graduate student stopped again for secondary screening",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-graduate-student-stopped-again-secondary-screening/",
"first_published_at": "2019-11-08T17:34:13.141128Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-02-29T20:04:09.611447Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-02-29T20:04:09.526397Z",
"date": "2017-09-16",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Orlando",
"longitude": -81.37924,
"latitude": 28.53834,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"j0dk0\">Zainab Merchant, a graduate student at Harvard University and founder of online publication Zainab Rights, was stopped for secondary screening by Customs and Border Protection officers in Orlando, Florida, on Sept. 16, 2017.</p><p data-block-key=\"ldael\">The American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a <a href=\"https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/zainab-merchant-administrative-complaint-department-homeland-security\">complaint</a> with the Department of Homeland Security on Merchant’s behalf. <a href=\"https://www.aclu.org/cases/zainab-merchant\">According to the organizations</a>, Merchant was returning from a personal trip to Morocco with her husband when they were both redirected to secondary screening.</p><p data-block-key=\"fx0cd\">As was the case with Merchant’s <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-graduate-student-stopped-secondary-screening-electronic-devices-searched/\">previous stop catalogued by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker</a>, the officer who questioned her asked about her article on her experience crossing the border in 2016 and asked what she aimed to accomplish by writing it. According to the complaint, the officer also said, “Please don’t write anything bad about us.”</p><p data-block-key=\"km916\">The complaint also details that a CBP officer overheard Merchant speaking with another woman about their experiences while waiting in the screening area and reportedly said to them that when you fly, you sign off all your rights. “Do what you want, get a lawyer, get the courts involved, and do the redress, but you’ll never be able to get off,” the officer is quoted as saying.</p><p data-block-key=\"990er\">Merchant and her husband were held in secondary screening for approximately three hours before being released.</p><p data-block-key=\"vzj3b\">Merchant did not respond to the Tracker’s requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"t7q3u\">The complaint states that three months after the incident, Merchant received a voicemail from a DHS officer who identified himself as Agent Newcomb. He said, in regards to her security experiences every time she travels, that he “would like to come up with a solution that could make everyone happy.”</p><p data-block-key=\"dg3qw\">Merchant later met with Agent Newcomb and another officer who identified himself as Agent Jerome. The officers asked if she knew anyone who had been “radicalized,” hinting that if she provided them information they could resolve her travel issues. She declined to meet with them again.</p><p data-block-key=\"7ks52\">The complaint states that the years of heightened security screenings has had a severe impact on Merchant. “She avoids flying if possible and experiences extreme frustration, anxiety, and humiliation when she does fly,” the complaint says.</p><p data-block-key=\"xjmzx\">In a 2018 opinion article in The Washington Post, Merchant <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/i-may-have-to-quit-harvard--because-the-tsa-wont-stop-searching-me/2018/08/14/0dbdbb72-9a55-11e8-b55e-5002300ef004_story.html\">wrote that her experiences</a> being targeted for prolonged secondary screenings exposed the shifting values in America: “Its greatest qualities of freedom, liberty and opportunity have undoubtedly shaped the person I am today. But these values are slowly diminishing, and those liberties are being taken away from us little by little. I fear one day we will be unable to recognize it as the place we called home.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "",
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": "1:17-cv-11730",
"case_type": "CIVIL",
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": "Orlando International Airport",
"target_us_citizenship_status": "U.S. citizen",
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": true,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": "no",
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": "yes",
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Florida",
"abbreviation": "FL"
},
"updates": [
"(2021-06-28 00:00:00+00:00) Supreme Court declines to hear case on warrantless electronic device searches at border",
"(2019-11-12 12:40:00+00:00) Federal court finds warrantless searches of devices violates Fourth Amendment of travelers"
],
"case_statuses": [
"dismissed"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [
"United States"
],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Border Stop"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Zainab Merchant (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Protesters threaten, throw water on KTVI reporter covering protest in St. Louis",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/protesters-threaten-throw-water-ktvi-reporter-covering-protest-st-louis/",
"first_published_at": "2017-09-26T20:03:22.452198Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-04-16T19:01:56.678572Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-04-16T19:01:56.563507Z",
"date": "2017-09-15",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "St. Louis",
"longitude": -90.19789,
"latitude": 38.62727,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"3a977\">While covering a protest in St. Louis on Sept. 15, 2017, KTVI reporter Dan Gray was hit with water bottles and pressured to leave the area by protesters, he said in an on-air segment on KTVI.</p><p data-block-key=\"nwhja\">The protests followed the acquittal of Jason Stockley, a white former St. Louis police officer who in 2011 fatally shot Anthony Lamar Smith, a black man.</p><p data-block-key=\"777ud\">“One agitator in particular had been taunting us for most of the day, and then continued to taunt us, and other people had heard what he was saying,” Gray said <a href=\"https://www.stltoday.com/online/media/stltodaymobile/ktvi-reporter-surrounded-confronted-during-stockley-protests/youtube_297329fa-4d6d-583a-9a6b-6ae785c7a674.html\">on KTVI</a>. “He was complaining about the media, complaining about me in particular. He singled me out for some reason. I guess he knew that I had been in St. Louis a long time because he said, ‘You’ve been reporting on this for 30 years. You’ve been reporting black-on-black crime, black people shooting black people, for 30 years, and didn’t do anything.’ So their anger and frustration turned and focused on us at that point. I became surrounded by a group of people. Some of the folks came to protect us as you can see.”</p><p data-block-key=\"w6gg4\">Gray reported that he was <a href=\"https://fox2now.com/news/scary-moments-for-a-fox-2-reporter-during-a-stockley-protest/\">hit by three water bottles</a>, one in the back of the head, and concluded the segment saying, “Again, I understand these people’s frustration. I understand their anger. Perhaps they needed someone to vent it to. Perhaps they needed somebody to go after and criticize. We’re ok. We’re fine. But it just shows how fast things can turn.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2qiht\">Gray tweeted a video of the event describing it as the “scariest moment in my career.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3vwmo\">A video filmed by St. Louis Post-Dispatch journalist Denise Hollinshed shows a man following Gray and his camerawoman, Tauna Price, as they attempt to leave the protest.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-video\">\n\n<figure class=\"inline-media full-width\">\n <div style=\"padding-bottom: 56.25%;\" class=\"responsive-object\">\n <iframe width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/akVKfm1gNc4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen></iframe>\n</div>\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n \n <p data-block-key=\"1bqsc\">KTVI reporter Dan Gray is followed and threatened by protesters while reporting in St. Louis.</p>\n \n \n <p>St. Louis Post-Dispatch</p>\n \n </figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"0swbi\">As Dan and Tauna attempt to extricate themselves from the protesters, a women can be seen several feet behind Gray, attempting to separate him from the protesters, saying “Go faster. Go faster.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fjswu\">Then, a male protester moves toward Gray shouting, “You shouldn’t be over here man. You motherfuckers shouldn’t even be over here. Why the fuck would you come over? Why the fuck would you come over here though? You know you shouldn’t be over here. You should get your ass somewhere where you belong. Why the fuck are you trying to fuck my movement? Get your ass away and find you something better to do. Get the fuck out of my movement, motherfucker. And I’m saying it in your motherfucking face.”</p><p data-block-key=\"lqg4o\">At that point the man steps directly in the path of Gray who steps backward, briefly surrounded by commotion, before he’s pulled forward by the crew filming and several friendly protesters. One protester appears to throw water at him.</p><p data-block-key=\"4qjmp\">As Gray and Price continue to move up Market Street, the crowd diminishes and Hollinshed asks Gray how he’s doing.</p><p data-block-key=\"cad9k\">“Shaken,” he says. “I’m shaken and a bit scared as the mob kind of surrounded me and my photographer. We got water thrown at us. We got yelled and shoved and pushed. I understand people’s frustrations with the judge’s decision, but they seem to be taking it out on the news media.. My boss said if there were any confrontation, any threat of violence, we’re leaving. So we’re leaving.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Scariest moment in my career. Protesters upset about not guilty verdict for an officer accused of killing a suspect, turn on me and media. <a href=\"https://t.co/iZyvg3gX0p\">pic.twitter.com/iZyvg3gX0p</a></p>— Dan Gray KTVI Fox 2 (@DanGrayTV) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/DanGrayTV/status/908836675446497280\">September 15, 2017</a></blockquote>\r\n<script async src=\"//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screen_Shot_2017-09-26_at_4.04.13.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"udd1u\">A screengrab from a video shows protesters pouring water on KTVI reporter Dan Gray.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
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"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": "private individual",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
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"state": {
"name": "Missouri",
"abbreviation": "MO"
},
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"target_nationality": [],
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"court verdict",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Dan Gray (KTVI)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Second subpoena issued for independent journalist’s phone records",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/second-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/",
"first_published_at": "2023-06-26T18:34:48.969438Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-10T19:40:26.296424Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-10T19:40:26.117038Z",
"date": "2017-09-14",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Laredo",
"longitude": -99.50754,
"latitude": 27.50641,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"oyi8b\">Police in Laredo, Texas, subpoenaed the phone records of independent journalist Priscilla Villarreal for the second time on Sept. 14, 2017, as part of an investigation into a confidential source, according to filings reviewed by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. Her communication records have been subpoenaed at least four times.</p><p data-block-key=\"bd6g3\">Villarreal — known by her pen name “La Gordiloca” — published the name of a Border Patrol agent who died by suicide on her Facebook page in April, before the Laredo Police Department’s official release about the incident. The LPD opened an investigation to identify who leaked Villarreal the name.</p><p data-block-key=\"5e7o9\">According to an arrest warrant approval form, an LPD officer <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/prosecutors-subpoenaed-citizen-journalist-cell-phone-during-investigation/\">first subpoenaed</a> the call log records for the cellphones of Villarreal and her suspected source on July 27. On Sept. 14, the officer sent a second subpoena seeking call logs from Jan. 1 through Sept. 13 for the phone numbers belonging to both Villarreal and her suspected source. It was not immediately clear when AT&T provided the requested records, but references to phone records provided by the telecommunication company indicate that the records were turned over.</p><p data-block-key=\"fuin6\">Two additional subpoenas for Villarreal’s text messages were filed on <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/third-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/\">Sept. 28</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/fourth-subpoena-issued-for-independent-journalists-phone-records/\">Oct. 6</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"2jn06\">Villarreal was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/citizen-journalist-arrested-after-publishing-information-local-police/\">arrested in December</a> and charged with two third-degree felonies for “misuse of official information.” An attorney representing Villarreal filed a writ of habeas corpus challenging the constitutionality of the charges in February 2018.</p><p data-block-key=\"a0isp\">“Today, in the State of Texas, it is illegal to simply ask a public servant for information if the information sought happens to be described in an obscure list of information categories that are subject to discretionary disclosure — rather than mandatory,” attorney Oscar Peña wrote. “The only thing keeping journalists from being prosecuted for this every day is the mercy of the police, the prosecutors and the political cost attendant. This too is alarming.”</p><p data-block-key=\"bq4du\">A Texas state judge ruled in favor of Villarreal in March 2018 and dismissed the charges, finding that the statute the journalist was charged under was unconstitutionally vague.</p><p data-block-key=\"1g4p5\">In April 2019, Villarreal <a href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/405495470/Priscilla-Villarreal-Complaint-SDTX\">filed a civil lawsuit</a> against the city of Laredo, Webb County and 10 law enforcement officials. The case was initially dismissed by a U.S. magistrate judge in May 2020, but a federal court of appeals <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/citizen-journalist-arrested-after-publishing-information-local-police/\">reversed the decision</a> in November 2021.</p><p data-block-key=\"a9kgq\">In August 2022, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued a substitute decision with the addition of a dissenting opinion from Chief Judge Priscilla Richman and a concurring opinion from Judge James C. Ho.</p><p data-block-key=\"26ic0\">JT Morris, a senior attorney at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression who is representing Villarreal’s appeal, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the appellate court decided to rehear the case “en banc,” meaning that the entire bench of active judges for the court reheard the case.</p><p data-block-key=\"fn7d6\">Arguments before the judges were held in January 2023, Morris said, and the court’s ruling is now pending.</p></div>",
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"teaser": "",
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"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": "5:19-cv-00048",
"case_type": "CIVIL",
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": "AT&T",
"third_party_business": "telecom company",
"legal_order_venue": "State",
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Texas",
"abbreviation": "TX"
},
"updates": [
"(2024-01-23 12:02:00+00:00) Divided federal appeals court won’t revive Texas journalist’s lawsuit",
"(2025-04-08 00:00:00+00:00) Appeals court again dismisses Texas journalist’s arrest-related lawsuit",
"(2024-10-15 17:12:00+00:00) U.S. Supreme Court revives Texas journalist’s lawsuit related to her arrest"
],
"case_statuses": [
"dismissed"
],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
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"tags": [],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Subpoena/Legal Order"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Priscilla Villarreal (Independent)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
}
]
