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{
"title": "Photographer assaulted, had camera stolen while covering Manhattan protests for NY Post",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-assaulted-had-camera-stolen-while-covering-manhattan-protests-ny-post/",
"first_published_at": "2020-09-09T13:59:35.580815Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-13T17:56:56.712946Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-13T17:56:56.619613Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "New York",
"longitude": -74.00597,
"latitude": 40.71427,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"1l24m\">Freelance photographer Stephen Yang was assaulted by an unknown individual and had his camera stolen while covering protests in New York City on June 1, 2020, for the New York Post.</p><p data-block-key=\"q5mu7\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a Minneapolis, Minnesota, police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, for more than eight minutes during a May 25 arrest. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. The incident sparked anti-police brutality and Black Lives Matter demonstrations across the country.</p><p data-block-key=\"5kb4j\">Yang told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that while covering June 1 protests in Manhattan he was taking photos of individuals looting stores near the intersection of Sixth Avenue and 39th Street.</p><p data-block-key=\"zoex0\">He said that an unknown individual approached him from behind and began to yank on his camera strap. Yang said that the individual then punched him in the face and was able to get the camera free from his shoulder.</p><p data-block-key=\"n0pcd\">Yang said the blow left him with a bloody nose but that he did not seek medical attention. He also said he did not get a clear look at the individual who threw the punch and that he didn’t believe he was targeted for being a journalist.</p><p data-block-key=\"n6ghc\">Yang said that police officers at the scene did not directly witness the assault but that one officer approached him after it was over and encouraged him to report it.</p><p data-block-key=\"38ki3\">He later reported the assault and the camera theft to the New York City Police Department. He said the stolen camera was valued at $2,500 and that his equipment is covered by insurance.</p><p data-block-key=\"8g4ud\">Fortunately, Yang was carrying a backup camera on the night of the assault and was able to keep covering protests for several more hours, he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"16dfn\">Yang said he did not encounter any further violence while covering demonstrations in New York City, but that he took time off work after the June 1 assault to recuperate.</p><p data-block-key=\"mppkl\">“I had to take a couple of days off after, I think, just for my mental health,” Yang said. “Overall I felt extremely lucky that this was the only incident I’ve experienced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"orbij\">The NYPD did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"8vcf9\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas, or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"lglyx\">A New York City police officer stands in front of a vandalized store following protests in the Manhattan borough of New York on June 1, 2020.</p>",
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{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera"
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{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera lens"
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"state": {
"name": "New York",
"abbreviation": "NY"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest",
"robbery"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Stephen Yang (New York Post)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
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{
"title": "Telemundo journalists hit with projectiles during protests in DC",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/telemundo-journalists-hit-projectiles-during-protests-dc/",
"first_published_at": "2020-08-10T18:59:02.794017Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-17T15:53:32.846582Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-17T15:53:32.756458Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Washington",
"longitude": -77.03637,
"latitude": 38.89511,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"aydoq\">Multiple journalists for the Spanish-language outlet Telemundo reported being hit with projectiles while covering protests near the White House on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"ptd2h\">The protests that day were part of a wave of demonstrations resulting from a viral video showing a Minneapolis, Minnesota, police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest on May 25. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"dhvfj\">The Telemundo journalists — cameraman Edwin López, senior Washington correspondent Cristina Londoño Rooney and bureau chief Lori Montenegro — reported being hit with projectiles as law enforcement officials attempted to disperse protesters half an hour before the district’s 7 p.m. curfew on June 1 and as President Donald Trump addressed the nation from the Rose Garden, nearby.</p><p data-block-key=\"kon3q\">Emailed requests to the Telemundo journalists for interviews were not returned as of press time.</p><p data-block-key=\"s03uz\">In a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/luisfemiami/status/1267615162355388417\">video</a> posted shortly before being hit, Londoño described “a very tense atmosphere” and how tear gas was “already starting to make our throats itch.” She wondered if “protesters are aware that the president will be addressing the nation any time.”</p><p data-block-key=\"qppqe\">After the attack, the Colombian journalist posted a <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=731606084241442\">video</a> in which she detailed the journalists’ injuries, stating that López had been hit on his right arm and ribs; that Montenegro had been hit on the back and that her throat was sore after breathing air filled with tear gas; and that law enforcement had used “long weapons that were pointing at us” to push them out of the area close to the White House.</p><p data-block-key=\"gyvq0\">In a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/CristiLondono/status/1269111643012808704/photo/1\">tweet on June 5</a>, Londoño shared pictures of her wounds and bruises, writing, “The White House also said rubber bullets were not used. Can anyone tell me what this looks like?”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"es\" dir=\"ltr\">La Casa Blanca negó que usaron gases lacrimógenos o balas de goma para dispersar a los manifestantes y periodistas el lunes. Sentí los gases y el <a href=\"https://twitter.com/washingtonpost?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@washingtonpost</a> ahora los confirma. Y esto ¿Me pueden decir esto qué es? <a href=\"https://t.co/CkjEIPSwqu\">pic.twitter.com/CkjEIPSwqu</a></p>— Cristina Londoño Rooney (@CristiLondono) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/CristiLondono/status/1269111643012808704?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 6, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"gjpgj\">D.C. is notable for the<a href=\"https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/05/protests-washington-dc-federal-agents-law-enforcement-302551\"> large number of different police forces</a> that operate within its borders. Park Police said in a <a href=\"https://www.nps.gov/subjects/uspp/6_2_20_statement_from_acting_chief_monahan.htm\">statement</a> on June 2 that its officers and other assisting law enforcement partners had not used tear gas that day, though multiple outlets, including the <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/park-police-spokesman-acknowledges-chemical-agents-used-on-lafayette-square-protesters-are-similar-to-tear-gas/2020/06/05/971a8d78-a75a-11ea-b473-04905b1af82b_story.html\">Washington Post</a>, have reported that “chemical agents” were deployed. Regarding this particular incident, Park Police did not respond to our request for comment as of press time.</p><p data-block-key=\"ce0vn\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p></div>",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
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"state": {
"name": "District of Columbia",
"abbreviation": "DC"
},
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
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"Edwin López (Telemundo)"
],
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{
"title": "Student journalist pepper sprayed, threatened with arrest while covering Columbus protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/student-journalist-pepper-sprayed-threatened-with-arrest-while-covering-columbus-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2021-10-19T15:23:18.383042Z",
"last_published_at": "2022-03-10T22:03:12.738694Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2022-03-10T22:03:12.678572Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Columbus",
"longitude": -82.99879,
"latitude": 39.96118,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"tzvyh\">Three journalists from The Lantern, the Ohio State University student newspaper, were pepper sprayed and threatened with arrest by police officers while covering protests in Columbus, Ohio, on June 1, 2020. The three students clearly and repeatedly identified themselves as members of the media before the assault, according to interviews with the journalists and video footage of the incident.</p><p data-block-key=\"ra1v3\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"hisqe\">On the night of June 1, Lantern editors Max Garrison, Sarah Szilagy and Maeve Walsh were covering peaceful protests that had moved from the Ohio Statehouse in downtown Columbus toward the Ohio State University campus. About 20 minutes after a 10 p.m. curfew went into effect, the protesters reached the intersection of North High Street and Lane Avenue on the edge of campus.</p><p data-block-key=\"0dpxm\">Up until this point, the journalists had not noticed a police presence. A few minutes after reaching the intersection, however, police cars suddenly arrived and stopped behind the protesters, Garrison and Walsh told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"gvbtj\">Police officers got out of their cars, walked swiftly through the crowd, and began using pepper spray to disperse the protesters, they said. The three journalists, who were standing behind a concrete barrier on the sidewalk, somewhat removed from the protesters in the street, remained on the scene as the protesters left, Garrison and Walsh told the Tracker. Szilagy, the Lantern’s campus editor, did not respond to emailed requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"t544h\">The journalists were then “approached from multiple directions by police officers telling them to ‘go home’ because of the curfew,” according to an <a href=\"https://www.thelantern.com/2020/06/lantern-journalists-targeted-by-police-pepper-sprayed/\">account</a> of the incident Garrison wrote for The Lantern.</p><p data-block-key=\"ci6fi\">“Our reporters continued to film and identify themselves as members of the news media, who are exempt from the curfew,” wrote Garrison, who is the assistant campus editor. “A group of police officers continued to yell over our reporters, saying they ‘don’t care’ and ‘get inside.’ The officers also threatened our reporters with arrest.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Columbus Police began spraying protestors around 10:25 at the corner of High and Lane. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/m_p_garrison?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@m_p_garrison</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sarahszilagy?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@sarahszilagy</a> and I were also sprayed despite making them aware we are members of <a href=\"https://twitter.com/TheLantern?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@TheLantern</a>. The press is exempt from the curfew. <a href=\"https://t.co/BcyitLujyQ\">pic.twitter.com/BcyitLujyQ</a></p>— Maeve Walsh (@maevewalsh27) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/maevewalsh27/status/1267646128289447939?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"w8jd9\">Another group of officers approached and “got very close to us,” according to Garrison, forcing them to step back. Garrison said one officer pushed him. Another shot pepper spray at the group from point-blank range, hitting him on the arm and Szilagy in the eyes, Garrison said. Walsh was not directly hit, but said the gas made her cough.</p><p data-block-key=\"sqglh\">In a video of the incident The Lantern posted to Twitter, the journalists are pepper sprayed after repeatedly identifying as media who are “exempt from curfew.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Hi everyone: this was me. I was sprayed in the face after we identified ourselves and presented our press passes multiple times. Media are exempt from curfew. Media are exempt from curfew. <a href=\"https://t.co/DAIDudVpud\">https://t.co/DAIDudVpud</a></p>— Sarah Szilagy (@sarahszilagy) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sarahszilagy/status/1267645179567263746?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"kw887\">Adam Cairns, a staff photographer with the Columbus Dispatch, witnessed the attack. Cairns told the Tracker that he had been standing near the edge of the intersection with the student journalists, but turned to walk away before another officer came around the corner and shot pepper spray at the journalists. “[I] will attest that they were screaming at the cops that they were media,” Cairns <a href=\"https://twitter.com/atomicphoto/status/1267661446411943936\">posted to Twitter</a>. “Police, despite clearly seeing press credentials, did not care. I crossed Lane at that point and missed the pepper spray.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Here is a photo of <a href=\"https://twitter.com/TheLantern?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@TheLantern</a> journalists showing their press IDs to police moments before being pepper sprayed <a href=\"https://t.co/Mvr4TLT83F\">pic.twitter.com/Mvr4TLT83F</a></p>— Adam Cairns (@atomicphoto) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/atomicphoto/status/1267675830882369536?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"qjfde\">The three journalists turned to flee but were followed by an officer who fired pepper spray at their backs before they turned into an alley, according to Garrison. They then sought refuge nearby at the house of their editor, Sam Raudins, where they spent several hours recovering. None of them returned to the protests that night. “They basically just censored us,” Szilagy <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2020/06/03/ohio-state-student-journalists-told-police-they-were-media-then-police-sprayed-them/\">told The Washington Post</a>, “and made us incapable of covering other things that happened that night.”</p><p data-block-key=\"d9x3o\">In the hours following the attack, Raudins sent an email to the Columbus Division of Police reporting the incident. “This was not our team getting caught in the crossfire; this was a direct interaction between CPD and The Lantern,” she wrote in the letter posted to Twitter.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Our editor-in-chief <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sam_raudins?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@sam_raudins</a> emailed <a href=\"https://twitter.com/ColumbusPolice?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@ColumbusPolice</a>, reporting how officers threatened to arrest and then pepper-sprayed our reporters after our reporters identified themselves as members of the news media. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/columbusprotest?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#columbusprotest</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/UXaSYC9bVQ\">pic.twitter.com/UXaSYC9bVQ</a></p>— The Lantern (@TheLantern) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/TheLantern/status/1267654250072588288?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"eonqu\">In a press conference the following day, Columbus Police Chief Thomas Quinlan was asked about the police officers’ treatment of journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"6c5ip\">“There’s no malice involved, there’s no intent, it’s just a very chaotic situation,” Quinlan <a href=\"https://www.10tv.com/article/news/local/watch-mayor-ginther-chief-quinlan-hold-briefing-discuss-columbus-protests-2020-jun/530-d7f35334-ca71-40fb-9508-6ca49a458c8f\">said</a>. “And in that regard, I’d ask the public to have some patience and please comply, and we’ll work it out afterward. But please don’t stand there and argue; move along and comply and we’ll fix this after the fact so nothing bad happens.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2ehwe\">Quinlan also said, “we are dealing with imperfect human beings in imperfect situations. Mistakes will happen and we will take action to correct them and make sure that we do not allow our mistakes to be repeated.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8m4h4\">When asked specifically about the incident involving the Ohio State student journalists, Quinlan said the reporters were not easily recognizable as news media, but the department had launched an internal affairs investigation of the officers, the <a href=\"https://www.dispatch.com/news/20200602/columbus-police-to-investigate-officers-who-pepper-sprayed-ohio-state-student-journalists?rssfeed=true\">Dispatch reported</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"r5f98\">“We are aware of the incident in question and it is currently under investigation per our use of force policy,” Sergeant James Fuqua, public information officer, said in response to the Tracker’s request for a status update.</p><p data-block-key=\"4urkr\">The Columbus Division of Police did not respond to the Tracker’s request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"mg48a\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?tags=111\">here</a>.</p></div>",
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"name": "Ohio",
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"chemical irritant",
"protest",
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{
"title": "Student journalist pepper sprayed, threatened with arrest amid Columbus protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/student-journalist-pepper-sprayed-threatened-with-arrest-amid-columbus-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2020-07-29T18:41:21.413848Z",
"last_published_at": "2022-03-10T22:02:10.897374Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2022-03-10T22:02:10.837196Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Columbus",
"longitude": -82.99879,
"latitude": 39.96118,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"6yndf\">Three journalists from The Lantern, the Ohio State University student newspaper, were pepper sprayed and threatened with arrest by police officers while covering protests in Columbus, Ohio, on June 1, 2020. The three students clearly and repeatedly identified themselves as members of the media before the assault, according to interviews with the journalists and video footage of the incident.</p><p data-block-key=\"1mjb0\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"da4ez\">On the night of June 1, Lantern editors Maeve Walsh, Sarah Szilagy and Max Garrison were covering peaceful protests that had moved from the Ohio Statehouse in downtown Columbus toward the Ohio State University campus. About 20 minutes after a 10 p.m. curfew went into effect, the protesters reached the intersection of North High Street and Lane Avenue on the edge of campus.</p><p data-block-key=\"i34s0\">Up until this point, the journalists had not noticed a police presence. A few minutes after reaching the intersection, however, police cars suddenly arrived and stopped behind the protesters, Walsh and Garrison told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"ud1a2\">Police officers got out of their cars, walked swiftly through the crowd, and began using pepper spray to disperse the protesters, they said. The three journalists, who were standing behind a concrete barrier on the sidewalk, somewhat removed from the protesters in the street, remained on the scene as the protesters left, Walsh and Garrison told the Tracker. Szilagy, the Lantern’s campus editor, did not respond to emailed requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"ovrul\">The journalists were then “approached from multiple directions by police officers telling them to ‘go home’ because of the curfew,” according to an <a href=\"https://www.thelantern.com/2020/06/lantern-journalists-targeted-by-police-pepper-sprayed/\">account</a> of the incident Garrison wrote for The Lantern.</p><p data-block-key=\"thgz1\">Walsh, special projects editor, said that all three journalists were holding their press passes in the air to show them to the officers and repeatedly identified themselves as press. In a video Walsh posted to Twitter, an officer tells her, “Leave or you’re going to jail.” When Walsh responds, “we’re members of the media,” the officer says, “I don’t care.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Columbus Police began spraying protestors around 10:25 at the corner of High and Lane. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/m_p_garrison?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@m_p_garrison</a> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sarahszilagy?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@sarahszilagy</a> and I were also sprayed despite making them aware we are members of <a href=\"https://twitter.com/TheLantern?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@TheLantern</a>. The press is exempt from the curfew. <a href=\"https://t.co/BcyitLujyQ\">pic.twitter.com/BcyitLujyQ</a></p>— Maeve Walsh (@maevewalsh27) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/maevewalsh27/status/1267646128289447939?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ds8xx\">Another group of officers approached and “got very close to us,” according to Garrison, forcing them to step back. Garrison said one officer pushed him. Another shot pepper spray at the group from point-blank range, hitting him on the arm and Szilagy in the eyes, Garrison said. Walsh was not directly hit, but said the gas made her cough.</p><p data-block-key=\"a01e2\">In a video of the incident The Lantern posted to Twitter, the journalists are pepper sprayed after repeatedly identifying as media who are “exempt from curfew.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Hi everyone: this was me. I was sprayed in the face after we identified ourselves and presented our press passes multiple times. Media are exempt from curfew. Media are exempt from curfew. <a href=\"https://t.co/DAIDudVpud\">https://t.co/DAIDudVpud</a></p>— Sarah Szilagy (@sarahszilagy) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sarahszilagy/status/1267645179567263746?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"nidb6\">Adam Cairns, a staff photographer with the Columbus Dispatch, witnessed the attack. Cairns told the Tracker that he had been standing near the edge of the intersection with the student journalists, but turned to walk away before another officer came around the corner and shot pepper spray at the journalists. “[I] will attest that they were screaming at the cops that they were media,” Cairns <a href=\"https://twitter.com/atomicphoto/status/1267661446411943936\">posted to Twitter</a>. “Police, despite clearly seeing press credentials, did not care. I crossed Lane at that point and missed the pepper spray.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Here is a photo of <a href=\"https://twitter.com/TheLantern?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@TheLantern</a> journalists showing their press IDs to police moments before being pepper sprayed <a href=\"https://t.co/Mvr4TLT83F\">pic.twitter.com/Mvr4TLT83F</a></p>— Adam Cairns (@atomicphoto) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/atomicphoto/status/1267675830882369536?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"gbfjo\">The three journalists turned to flee but were followed by an officer who fired pepper spray at their backs before they turned into an alley, according to Garrison. They then sought refuge nearby at the house of their editor, Sam Raudins, where they spent several hours recovering. None of them returned to the protests that night. “They basically just censored us,” Szilagy <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2020/06/03/ohio-state-student-journalists-told-police-they-were-media-then-police-sprayed-them/\">told The Washington Post</a>, “and made us incapable of covering other things that happened that night.”</p><p data-block-key=\"slsr8\">In the hours following the attack, Raudins sent an email to the Columbus Division of Police reporting the incident. “This was not our team getting caught in the crossfire; this was a direct interaction between CPD and The Lantern,” she wrote in the letter posted to Twitter.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Our editor-in-chief <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sam_raudins?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@sam_raudins</a> emailed <a href=\"https://twitter.com/ColumbusPolice?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@ColumbusPolice</a>, reporting how officers threatened to arrest and then pepper-sprayed our reporters after our reporters identified themselves as members of the news media. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/hashtag/columbusprotest?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#columbusprotest</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/UXaSYC9bVQ\">pic.twitter.com/UXaSYC9bVQ</a></p>— The Lantern (@TheLantern) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/TheLantern/status/1267654250072588288?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"4c1r5\">In a press conference the following day, Columbus Police Chief Thomas Quinlan was asked about the police officers’ treatment of journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"z7mh8\">“There’s no malice involved, there’s no intent, it’s just a very chaotic situation,” Quinlan <a href=\"https://www.10tv.com/article/news/local/watch-mayor-ginther-chief-quinlan-hold-briefing-discuss-columbus-protests-2020-jun/530-d7f35334-ca71-40fb-9508-6ca49a458c8f\">said</a>. “And in that regard, I’d ask the public to have some patience and please comply, and we’ll work it out afterward. But please don’t stand there and argue; move along and comply and we’ll fix this after the fact so nothing bad happens.”</p><p data-block-key=\"n6a3g\">Quinlan also said, “we are dealing with imperfect human beings in imperfect situations. Mistakes will happen and we will take action to correct them and make sure that we do not allow our mistakes to be repeated.”</p><p data-block-key=\"kk9ri\">When asked specifically about the incident involving the Ohio State student journalists, Quinlan said the reporters were not easily recognizable as news media, but the department had launched an internal affairs investigation of the officers, the <a href=\"https://www.dispatch.com/news/20200602/columbus-police-to-investigate-officers-who-pepper-sprayed-ohio-state-student-journalists?rssfeed=true\">Dispatch reported</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"01kp7\">“We are aware of the incident in question and it is currently under investigation per our use of force policy,” Sergeant James Fuqua, public information officer, said in response to the Tracker’s request for a status update.</p><p data-block-key=\"2gr3g\">The Columbus Division of Police did not respond to the Tracker’s request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"lq3x5\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?tags=111\">here</a>.</p></div>",
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"state": {
"name": "Ohio",
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"protest",
"student journalism"
],
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"Assault"
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{
"title": "Photojournalist assaulted while covering aftermath of protests in Chicago",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-assaulted-while-covering-aftermath-protests-chicago/",
"first_published_at": "2020-07-21T19:56:24.745568Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-04T18:06:42.628153Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-04T18:06:42.524858Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Chicago",
"longitude": -87.65005,
"latitude": 41.85003,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"96q38\">Ken Bedford, a veteran photographer and cameraman for the television station ABC 7 Chicago, reported that he was assaulted by an unidentified individual on June 1, 2020, while covering damage left in the wake of protests and looting in the South Shore neighborhood.</p><p data-block-key=\"lfvbc\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"z8bqr\">On the afternoon of June 1, Bedford and ABC7 reporter Leah Hope were preparing to report on clean-up efforts in the aftermath of looting the night before. They were at a strip mall at the intersection of 75th and Stony Island streets. Suddenly, Bedford was attacked from behind and knocked to the ground by an unidentified man, Bedford <a href=\"https://news.wttw.com/2020/06/09/journalists-wage-legal-fights-after-facing-protest-attacks\">told WTTW</a>, Chicago’s PBS station. Bedford said he didn’t see the man approaching.</p><p data-block-key=\"n95r1\">He “shouldered me and thrusted me forward into the camera and then ultimately to the ground,” Bedford told WTTW. “And then he ran off.”</p><p data-block-key=\"vbizj\">Bedford, who did not respond to emailed requests for comment, wrote in a <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2025624964247946&id=177747199035741\">Facebook post</a> the following day that his camera and tripod had helped break his fall, but that he scraped his knee and bruised his elbow.</p><p data-block-key=\"p76sf\">According to Bedford’s Facebook post, the photojournalist got up and began to pursue his assailant, but the man had joined a “few more men, who were talking among themselves and looking in my direction,” he wrote. “As they started walking towards me, I decided then it was no longer safe for us and I took the camera off the tripod, lowered the tripod slowly and placed them in my car, got in and drove off slowly.”</p><p data-block-key=\"wxydt\">ABC7 did not respond to Tracker calls or emails for comment but published that it <a href=\"https://abc7chicago.com/6225826/?fbclid=IwAR0naePt2mLHedSiZCKhGofr9A6csxbiZaF5M53iW86q4NbqRrI7Ga59TKA\">reported</a> the incident to the police.</p><p data-block-key=\"902ml\">The Chicago Police Department did not respond to a request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"93zsp\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
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"assailant": "private individual",
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"state": {
"name": "Illinois",
"abbreviation": "IL"
},
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Ken Bedford (WLS-TV)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reporter assaulted while covering Little Rock protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/arkansas-democrat-gazette-reporter-assaulted-while-covering-little-rock-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2020-07-21T02:18:44.373413Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-17T15:53:02.779287Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-17T15:53:02.676489Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Little Rock",
"longitude": -92.28959,
"latitude": 34.74648,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"rh6ql\">Tony Holt, a reporter for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, was struck in the face and injured while he covered protests in Little Rock, Arkansas, on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"jg87c\">Protests in Little Rock began after the death of George Floyd, a Black man, who was killed during an arrest in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020, when a white police officer kneeled on his neck for more than eight minutes. Floyd’s death prompted widespread demonstrations against racism and police violence across the country.</p><p data-block-key=\"lme98\">Holt was reporting on the third day of protests in Little Rock when he was hit and hurt to the point of needing medical treatment.</p><p data-block-key=\"gap9l\">Holt didn’t respond to a request for comment. Arkansas Democrat-Gazette Managing Editor Eliza Gaines detailed the incident in an interview with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"jbt74\">Shortly before he was attacked, Holt<a href=\"https://twitter.com/HoltDemGazette/status/1267653727349026818?s=20\"> tweeted</a> that hundreds of people were still out a few minutes past the city’s 10 p.m. curfew. People had been throwing rocks through windows and damaging property, Gaines said. Holt was “in the thick of it,” she said, when he felt someone take his reporter’s notebook from his pocket. Then he was struck with something.</p><p data-block-key=\"uj72j\">Gaines said many of the details around the attack were unclear. Holt doesn’t know exactly what happened to him, or who did it, she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"4g7ws\">A “good Samaritan” got him to emergency services, she said, and he was transferred to a hospital. Editors — alerted to the attack by a tweet Holt sent at the time — went to wait for word of his status outside the building, since Covid-19 restrictions barred them from entering.</p><p data-block-key=\"8tprn\">The following day, Holt posted on Twitter that his nose was broken in the attack and that he was in the hospital for five hours.</p><p data-block-key=\"44rzo\">“I have no memory of the attack last night in Little Rock, but there was a small group among the rioters who clearly didn’t want me there,” he wrote.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">I have no memory of the attack last night in Little Rock, but there was a small group among the rioters who clearly didn’t want me there. Suffered a broken nose, but no other fractures. All journos, seriously, be careful. I got too close and paid for it w/ a 5-hour hospital stay <a href=\"https://t.co/Dju2BfdsZ6\">pic.twitter.com/Dju2BfdsZ6</a></p>— Tony Holt (@HoltDemGazette) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/HoltDemGazette/status/1267825613009633285?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"rvi8x\">Holt wasn’t wearing anything that would clearly mark him as a reporter, Gaines said, though he had credentials with him and carried a notebook. The newspaper bought vests with the word “press” on the back for reporters after the assault on Holt, Gaines said, but “we realized it might put a target on someone's back.” Reporters can decide whether or not to wear them, Gaines said.</p><p data-block-key=\"5p9re\">“It'd be good if you had it so the police could see it but otherwise it's kind of, you know, alerting others that you're press,” she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"e890p\">Gaines said she didn’t believe the incident had been reported to police. A spokesperson for the Little Rock Police Department said police weren’t aware of the incident.</p><p data-block-key=\"q7bp3\">Two days earlier, reporter<a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/katv-reporter-assaulted-air-amid-little-rock-protests/\"> Shelby Rose of KATV Channel 7 News</a> was shouted at and struck with an object while she was broadcasting live from protests in Little Rock.</p><p data-block-key=\"v02vo\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd and others while in police custody. Find all of these cases <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\"> here</a>.</p></div>",
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"actor": "private individual",
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"assailant": "private individual",
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{
"quantity": 1,
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],
"state": {
"name": "Arkansas",
"abbreviation": "AR"
},
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
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{
"title": "Freelance photojournalist arrested amid curfew crackdown in Los Angeles",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-photojournalist-arrested-amid-curfew-crackdown-los-angeles/",
"first_published_at": "2020-07-28T03:26:57.868910Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:01:26.131273Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:01:26.001153Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"mag01\">Freelance photojournalist Robert Spangle was arrested while covering protests against police violence in Los Angeles on June 1, 2020, he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. Spangle’s exploration of fashion in the protests was published in <a href=\"https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/politics/article/george-floyd-protest-photos\">British GQ</a> and <a href=\"https://www.achtung-mode.com/black-lives-matter/\">Achtung Digital</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"0gv37\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"bre00\">As part of the protests, hundreds of demonstrators marched down Sunset Boulevard on June 1, according to <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-06-01/an-lapd-officer-takes-to-his-knee-to-cheers-of-hollywood-protesters\">news reports</a>. But after a 6 p.m. curfew, the majority of protesters began to disperse, Spangle said. He decided to head back toward his car.</p><p data-block-key=\"dztei\">Along the way, Spangle realized that law enforcement had begun to block streets, trapping protesters and Spangle on Schrader Boulevard near a parking lot just north of Sunset Boulevard. Fear and confusion took over the block, Spangle said.</p><p data-block-key=\"x7eek\">“This is kettling and we’re getting locked in here,” Spangle recalled thinking. “The thing to do is go out and loudly identify yourself as press.”</p><p data-block-key=\"wzfst\">Spangle, who was wearing a helmet with the word PRESS on it, stepped into the middle of the street with a badge identifying him as press in one hand and his camera in the other.</p><p data-block-key=\"cy1ik\">“At the top of my voice, I very loudly announced, ‘Hey I’m a journalist,’” Spangle said. “‘What do you want me to do, officer?’”</p><p data-block-key=\"yq7n8\">But he received no response. Six or seven times he said he tried to the same effect. So Spangle turned and approached another line of officers in the same way. Five or six times more he identified as a journalist, he said. But still, there was no response. Spangle was trapped.</p><p data-block-key=\"zxs0a\">Shortly before 9 p.m., two officers approached Spangle and ordered Spangle to get on his knees and put his hands on the back of his head, he told the Tracker. He was then zip-cuffed.</p><p data-block-key=\"3dpsi\">“I let them do their thing,” Spangle said. “I said, ‘Hey sir, please look at my press badge. I’m here as a journalist. I’m covering the event. I’m complying.’” He told the Tracker that he tried to draw on his military experience to respond in a calm, professional manner to resolve what he assumed was a mistake.</p><p data-block-key=\"qnrla\">Officers brought Spangle to a fence where they were gathering others that had been arrested, he said. Spangle asked a journalist on the other side of the fence, which was outside the police cordon, to contact his editor at GQ about his arrest.</p><p data-block-key=\"vdj8d\">After about thirty minutes, Spangle said he was taken to a transport vehicle along with other people who had been arrested. Officers performed a search of Spangle’s possessions and confiscated a small camera bag. But they left his cameras, press badge, and phone with him, Spangle said.</p><p data-block-key=\"niiwu\">Spangle said he never heard an officer acknowledge his repeated attempts to identify as a journalist. “I think there were efforts for those kinds of things to not be said out loud,” Spangle said.</p><p data-block-key=\"bil08\">As he got on the bus, he asked an officer to inform the supervisor he is a journalist, Spangle told the Tracker. The officer responded, “All I can say to you is you’ll be alright,” Spangle said. Spangle interpreted the answer as evidence that a bad command decision had been made to arrest everyone in the area, journalist or not.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ok42\">The bus drove around the city for hours, stopping at two other locations, until stopping to process the arrestees shortly before midnight at the parking lot of UCLA’s Jackie Robinson Stadium, Spangle said. He was one of the last on the bus to be released on a charge of violating the Los Angeles County curfew.</p><p data-block-key=\"u0024\">The university later issued a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/UCLA/status/1268039753015812096\">statement</a> saying it was “troubled” that the stadium was used as a processing center “without UCLA’s knowledge or permission.”</p><p data-block-key=\"0j9w6\">Spangle said he was arrested by Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies, who wear a distinct tan and green uniform that contrasts the dark blue worn by officers with the Los Angeles Police Department. Spangle said he was transported in a sheriff’s bus. He received a citation from the LAPD at a processing center in western Los Angeles and said he received his seized camera bag back with the citation.</p><p data-block-key=\"6nbv2\">Spokespeople for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and LAPD told the Tracker that they could not provide specific information on Spangle’s arrest because of the sheer number of arrests made during the protests.</p><p data-block-key=\"0f0pu\">Footage from <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=257541868845433&ref=watch_permalink\">news</a> <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrsBu80BCE4\">helicopters</a> that night shows LAPD officers, assisted by sheriff’s deputies, attempting to contain multiple marches and scattered looting across Hollywood. Arrested individuals were boarded on to sheriff’s buses for transport. The LAPD arrested a record-breaking 585 people in Hollywood alone, NBC <a href=\"https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/live-blog/2020-06-02-nationwide-protests-over-george-floyd-death-live-n1221821/ncrd1222691#blogHeader\">reported</a>, citing department officials.</p><p data-block-key=\"gduq0\">Officer Drake Madison, an LAPD spokesperson, suggested filing a public records request. On June 24, LAPD denied a <a href=\"https://www.muckrock.com/foi/los-angeles-91/los-angeles-arrest-record-for-photographer-robert-spangle-los-angeles-police-department-94146/\">records request</a> concerning Spangle’s arrest filed by journalist security expert Runa Sandvik with the collaborative reporting website MuckRock. In its response, LAPD said investigatory records are exempt from disclosure.</p><p data-block-key=\"gk1l0\">On June 8, <a href=\"https://da.lacounty.gov/media/news/district-attorney-jackie-lacey-will-not-file-charges-curfew-violations-failure-disperse\">Los Angeles County District Attorney</a> Jackie Lacey announced that she would not prosecute citations for violating curfew or failing to disperse, while <a href=\"https://www.lacityattorney.org/post/feuer-takes-restorative-non-punitive-approach-outside-the-court-system-for-peaceful-protesters\">Los Angeles City Attorney</a> Mike Feuer said he would resolve cases involving peaceful protesters in a “restorative approach” outside of the court system.</p><p data-block-key=\"5apt7\">On June 10, the LAPD said it had assigned <a href=\"http://www.lapdonline.org/home/news_view/66668\">40 investigators</a> to examine “allegations of misconduct, violations of Department policy, and excessive force during the recent civil unrest.”</p><p data-block-key=\"wj2qm\">Spangle said he did not feel any bitterness toward the officers who were following orders. “They were professional; they were courteous,” Spangle said. “They did the wrong thing but they did it professionally and in a courteous way.”</p><p data-block-key=\"aa9cq\">“Somewhere along the line there was a really bad call made,” Spangle said. He described it as, “press or whatever, it doesn’t matter, we’re arresting everyone.”</p><p data-block-key=\"biqro\">Rob Wilcox, a spokesperson for Feuer, told the Tracker that the office is in the process of sending thousands of declination letters to those arrested on curfew related charges. The letter says the office will use its prosecutorial discretion to not file criminal charges and invites the recipient to join a series of virtual conversations on law enforcement, bias, and injustice. Wilcox said 2,044 letters had been sent as of July 27 and the remainder will be sent by the end of the week.</p><p data-block-key=\"ixve0\">Spangle said as of July 27 he had not yet received the letter.</p><p data-block-key=\"s1chj\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"2kjla\">Freelance photojournalist Robert Spangle captured this image of a Los Angeles processing center seen from the parking lot of UCLA’s Jackie Robinson Stadium shortly after his arrest on June 1, 2020.</p>",
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"name": "California",
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"(2020-07-22 15:22:00+00:00) Charges dropped against freelance photojournalist arrested amid curfew crackdown in Los Angeles"
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},
{
"title": "Photographer hit with projectile, tear gas while covering protests in Louisville",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-hit-projectile-tear-gas-while-covering-protests-louisville/",
"first_published_at": "2020-07-08T12:22:55.718731Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-04T18:01:37.289163Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-04T18:01:37.189737Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
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"city": "Louisville",
"longitude": -85.75941,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"j6sr5\">Freelance photographer Amy Harris was hit by pepper balls shot by law enforcement officers while covering protests in Louisville, Kentucky, on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"g72q1\">The Associated Press <a href=\"https://apnews.com/ac63cb2f81e1adfba583451aee9115bf\">reported</a> that protests in Louisville have centered around the deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, both of whom were Black. Taylor was shot eight times in her Louisville home in mid-March by narcotics police who broke down her door. Floyd died on May 25, after a white police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, kneeled on his neck for several minutes during an arrest. Video of Floyd’s death has sparked protests across the country.</p><p data-block-key=\"nog34\">Harris told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she had been photographing peaceful protests for several hours around Jefferson Square Park when police officers, who had previously been present only on the roofs of surrounding buildings, began to appear on the ground to enforce a 9 p.m. curfew. At approximately 10:15, Harris said, officers lined up in riot formation and announced that everyone present was in violation of curfew and ordered them to disperse.</p><p data-block-key=\"0h33l\">The officers then began to shoot tear gas and pepper balls in all directions, according to Harris, and she was hit with a pepper ball. Both she and a nearby TV news crew, with whom she had paired up with earlier in the day for safety purposes, all felt the tear gas, she said. Harris said it was impossible to know whether they had been targeted.</p><p data-block-key=\"jyygl\">Harris and the other journalists tried to flee but couldn’t tell which direction the projectiles were coming from and felt surrounded on all sides, she told the Tracker. Eventually, they were able to retreat. Harris said they heard the sounds of gunshots from the crowd while leaving.</p><p data-block-key=\"gud81\">The TV crew and their security team accompanied Harris to her car and she was able to leave the scene. Harris said she had bruising from the pepper balls but otherwise was uninjured in the attack.</p><p data-block-key=\"gl6mb\">The Louisville Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"0u44e\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents — including others involving Harris — of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"9xsz2\">Photographer Amy Harris said she had been documenting protests around Louisville's Jefferson Square Park for several hours before she was hit with a projectile.</p>",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
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"state": {
"name": "Kentucky",
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},
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"shot / shot at"
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"Amy Harris (Freelance)"
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{
"title": "Freelance journalist struck by projectiles, then arrested while covering protest on Dallas bridge",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-journalist-struck-projectiles-then-arrested-while-covering-protest-dallas-bridge/",
"first_published_at": "2020-07-02T03:21:24.759560Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T23:46:31.068731Z",
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"date": "2020-06-01",
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"city": "Dallas",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"rczl6\">Police struck a Dallas journalist with projectiles, zip-tied his wrists and placed him under arrest while he was covering a protest march against police violence on a bridge over the Trinity River in Dallas, Texas on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"4z0e8\">Steven Monacelli, a freelance writer on assignment for the <a href=\"https://dallasvoice.com/\">Dallas Voice</a>, an LGBT magazine serving north Texas, had been documenting the march of several hundred protesters from the Dallas County courthouse to the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge over the Trinity River, he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. The evening of June 1 was the second that downtown Dallas was under a 7 p.m. curfew, from which members of the media were explicitly exempt.</p><p data-block-key=\"qjick\">On the bridge, police employed a <a href=\"https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-is-kettling-the-police-technique-used-in-george-floyd-protests-11591721558\">technique</a> known as “kettling” to hem in demonstrators from both sides. Monacelli was standing between the crowd and a police line, hugging one side of the bridge, when police began advancing towards the crowd, he said. One of the officers fired a wooden pellet, he said, which hit someone nearby before falling to the ground near Monacelli’s feet.</p><p data-block-key=\"26pjd\">Seconds later, Monacelli was hit by a projectile. “I just got hit in the leg,” he exclaims on a video recording of the incident, which he <a href=\"https://www.instagram.com/tv/CA6lRtthbgh/?igshid=eqfrzasewet9\">posted</a> to Instagram. A second projectile then struck his backpack and lower back. “They shot me twice, I’ve been shot twice with wooden pellets.”</p><p data-block-key=\"z0wi6\">Monacelli was wearing PRESS badges on his front and back, but said he didn’t have the opportunity to verbally identify himself as a member of the media before police fired on the crowd. He said it was dark on the bridge and very loud.</p><p data-block-key=\"43w0m\">Monacelli told the Tracker while he initially suspected the projectiles that hit him were made of wood, he now believes the object that hit the back of his left thigh was a canister of tear gas, because of the sound it made on the video and the size of his resulting bruise. “In various videos of the moment at which I was shot you can hear a loud ‘POP’ and then metal sounding ricochet,” he <a href=\"https://twitter.com/stevanzetti/status/1271290219669544960\">tweeted</a> days later.</p><p data-block-key=\"w9iq6\">The second projectile he believes was a green marking round, he said. Another freelance journalist on the bridge, Benjamin Diez, captured a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/benjamindiez_/status/1268024795452641281\">video</a> of Monacelli being hit, showing the round that hit Monacelli’s back and backpack gave off a puff of green dust on impact.</p><p data-block-key=\"cs11s\">Around ten minutes later, Monacelli was then detained with a group of protesters, despite his repeated declarations that he was a member of the media, he said. The officers demanded to see Monacelli’s laminated press credentials, which he didn’t have, and ignored his repeated invitations to view his LinkedIn profile on his phone, as well as his email exchanges with his editors.</p><p data-block-key=\"rd7ub\">“I'm reporting for the Dallas Voice, I've got the email from the editor. I'm a freelance journalist, so I can show you all the information...the magazine I'm with,” he told the police, in a video he <a href=\"https://www.instagram.com/p/CA6qYUjhqhu/\">posted</a> to Instagram. He said he had emailed his editor, who he hoped would call the police. “Not sure what else I could do to show you who I am.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5ubb2\">“What sort of credentials, when you ask me that, are you looking for?” Monacelli asked the officer standing before him. The officer replied that he wanted to see a press ID on a lanyard. "I'm stuck here because I don't have a laminated card," Monacelli then tells the viewers of his Instagram livestream.</p><p data-block-key=\"cgseg\">After detaining him over an hour, an officer placed him in zip ties at around 10:40 p.m. and told him he was under arrest. “Are you aware that I am a member of the press?” he said he asked the officer. In response, the officer replied, “you are under arrest,” Monacelli said.</p><p data-block-key=\"qb14g\">After midnight, an officer took him up on his invitation to look at his email messages with his editor and his LinkedIn page. Satisfied he was a journalist, the officer released Monacelli from the zip ties. He was released without charges.</p><p data-block-key=\"fbaky\">Later that morning, he snapped a photo of the newly formed bruise on the back of his leg, and <a href=\"https://twitter.com/stevanzetti/status/1271274218748067842/photo/2\">posted</a> it to Twitter on June 11. Monacelli documented his experience on the bridge in a <a href=\"https://dallasvoice.com/the-ringing-in-my-ears/\">story</a> in the Dallas Voice and in a <a href=\"https://www.centraltrack.com/the-first-four-days-on-dpd-toys-early-protest-response/\">piece</a> for Central Track, a website covering Dallas culture.</p><p data-block-key=\"aswsu\">Ryan Michalesko, a staff photographer at the Dallas Morning News, was hit in the thigh with a foam round while covering the same protest on the bridge. That incident is documented <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/dallas-morning-news-photojournalist-caught-crossfire-documenting-protesters-bridge/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"87b33\">Asked for comment on Monacelli’s arrest and the use of projectiles that led to his injuries, a spokesman for the Dallas Police Department, Sgt. Warren Mitchell, wrote, “We are not at a place we can speak on a specific incident during any nights of the protests.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fvmls\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"jcm7x\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Monacelli_arrest_0602.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"cbpxp\">Steven Monacelli, left, was hit with projectiles and detained while covering protests in Dallas, Texas, on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge on June 1, 2020.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "Dallas Police Department",
"arrest_status": "detained and released without being processed",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
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"state": {
"name": "Texas",
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},
"updates": [
"(2021-10-26 00:00:00+00:00) Freelance journalist sues city of Dallas, officers after being struck by projectiles and arrested during 2020 protests",
"(2023-12-29 00:00:00+00:00) Freelance journalist’s case against Dallas and police officers dismissed"
],
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"categories": [
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],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist choked, pushed in encounter with police officers while covering protest in Ohio",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-choked-pushed-encounter-police-officers-while-covering-protest-ohio/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-29T17:36:38.156494Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-17T15:52:31.020335Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-17T15:52:30.940747Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Cincinnati",
"longitude": -84.51439,
"latitude": 39.12711,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"z156m\">Journalist Nick Swartsell said police officers grabbed and pulled him by the bandana around his neck as he reported on protests in Cincinnati, Ohio, on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"r4rdt\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a black man, during an arrest on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"65jj8\">Police officers began to arrest protesters in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood shortly after the 8 p.m. curfew went into effect, said Swartsell, news editor for the weekly publication CityBeat Cincinnati. When Swartsell and another journalist, Pat Brennan of the Cincinnati Enquirer, walked around the right side of a police vehicle to observe an arrest taking place near the intersection of West McMicken Avenue and Mohawk Place, an officer told them to move to the other side of the vehicle, Swartsell said.</p><p data-block-key=\"tmkyj\">While complying with the orders, Swartsell said an officer suddenly yanked him by the back of the bandana tied around his neck, and pulled him backwards. The journalist was pulled so forcibly, he said, that he was choked by the bandana and felt like he couldn't breathe for several seconds. He was then pushed into a crowd of officers with shields who shoved him off to the side.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Police grabbing media. I was grabbed by my bandana from behind and pulled into a group of officers as they approached me. An enquirer reporter just hauled off. <a href=\"https://t.co/cNreMVFgyH\">pic.twitter.com/cNreMVFgyH</a></p>— Nick Swartsell (@nswartsell) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/nswartsell/status/1267612155840528385?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"65fgq\">Swartsell told the Tracker that he momentarily glimpsed body armor but otherwise couldn’t see the officer who had pulled him. He also said that he was unaware of body camera footage that captured the incident.</p><p data-block-key=\"e1lf2\">The force of the assault left red marks around Swartsell’s neck for several hours but he told the Tracker that he was otherwise uninjured. He immediately resumed reporting on the arrests. The journalist is covering the protests pro bono for CityBeat while on furlough due to the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.</p><p data-block-key=\"7rtkr\">The Enquirer’s Brennan was then <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/cincinnati-enquirer-journalist-detained-cameras-roll/\">forcibly detained</a> by police, which the Tracker documented separately.</p><p data-block-key=\"9vdw3\">The Cincinnati Police Department did not return requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"xal7y\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. Find all of these cases <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"state": {
"name": "Ohio",
"abbreviation": "OH"
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Nick Swartsell (Independent)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist hit by multiple individuals while broadcasting live from Times Square",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-hit-multiple-individuals-while-broadcasting-live-times-square/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-26T14:13:21.903653Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-13T17:54:22.446602Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-13T17:54:22.370259Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "New York",
"longitude": -74.00597,
"latitude": 40.71427,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"9nugp\">Hasanuzzaman Saki, a journalist for the Bengali-language news organization Somoy TV, was attacked by individuals in New York City on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"snty4\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"yt2ee\">According to an <a href=\"https://en.somoynews.tv/Somoy-TV-journo-attacked-during-live-coverage-of-protests-in-New-York/news/8468\">interview</a> the journalist gave to Somoy TV, Saki was in Times Square around 11 p.m. doing a standup to camera when he was attacked. In a <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=62&v=c9j2eAF5n2A&feature=emb_logo\">video of the incident</a> published on YouTube, he can be seen in front of a line of people, all wearing face masks. One smacks him on the back of the head while walking by; then, a second person takes a swing at him. Saki said the individuals also attacked his cameraperson and tried to confiscate the camera, but the Tracker was unable to independently verify that information. He added that he identified himself as a member of the media, was wearing a press pass and holding a microphone.</p><p data-block-key=\"c1g2c\">It’s unclear who the attackers were or what their motivations were.</p><p data-block-key=\"arwki\">“I never thought that I, myself, would become the news,” Saki told Somoy TV, according to an <a href=\"https://tbsnews.net/world/us-protesters-beat-somoy-tv-journalist-camera-87934\">English-language write-up</a> of the interview on TBS News, a site that focuses on Bangladesh.</p><p data-block-key=\"cqnv7\">Somoy TV and Saki did not respond to a request for an interview. The New York Police Department did not immediately respond when asked if this incident had been reported.</p><p data-block-key=\"crtnn\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/RTS39ZF6.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"wxleh\">People fill Times Square in New York City on June 1, 2020.</p>",
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"assailant": "private individual",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
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"state": {
"name": "New York",
"abbreviation": "NY"
},
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Hasanuzzaman Saki (Somoy TV)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Dallas Morning News photojournalist caught in crossfire documenting protesters on bridge",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/dallas-morning-news-photojournalist-caught-crossfire-documenting-protesters-bridge/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-25T20:59:04.260469Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-13T17:54:04.919495Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-13T17:54:04.828318Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Dallas",
"longitude": -96.80667,
"latitude": 32.78306,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"m7pi6\">A newspaper photographer was struck in the thigh by a foam round while documenting protesters hemmed in by law enforcement on a bridge in Dallas, Texas, on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"mob7i\">The protests were held in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Floyd was pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"7kqeb\">June 1 marked the second night of downtown Dallas’ 7 p.m. curfew, from which journalists were expressly excluded.</p><p data-block-key=\"lsv8o\">At around 9 p.m., Ryan Michalesko, a staff photojournalist at the Dallas Morning News, was photographing a group of several hundred protesters who’d marched from the county courthouse to the <a href=\"https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/santiago-calatrava-margaret-hunt-hill-bridge-article\">Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge</a>, an architectural landmark that spans the Trinity River and connects downtown and west Dallas.</p><p data-block-key=\"k3772\">A police line began to form across the bridge, Michalesko told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in an email. “Over their speakers they ordered the protesters to stop moving forward and turn around. At this point many of the protesters took a knee with their arms in the air,” he wrote. Police then deployed canisters of smoke into the crowd, followed by tear gas.</p><p data-block-key=\"yojbt\">Police in gas masks and riot gear began advancing on protesters from both sides of the bridge, employing a <a href=\"https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-is-kettling-the-police-technique-used-in-george-floyd-protests-11591721558\">technique</a> known as “kettling” to hem them into a small area. As protesters came to realize what was happening, Michalesko turned toward them, exposing his back to police, he told the Tracker. “I knew at that moment it was important I find a way to capture the fear in people’s eyes as they found themselves trapped,” Michalesko wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"bx088\">As he took photos, he regularly looked back over his shoulder at police. “This is when I was struck with a less-lethal round in the back of my upper thigh. I felt it hit, realized what had happened as I watched the blue-tipped projectile bounce across the ground,” he continued.</p><p data-block-key=\"k4zxi\">Michalesko was wearing press credentials, holding a camera and had another camera around his neck. But the shot came from 25 feet away, he estimated, putting him too far from police to be identifiable as press. He was unable to identify to which agency the officer who fired the shot belonged.</p><p data-block-key=\"pxckq\">Police then began to command everyone on the bridge to lie down on their stomachs, before firing foam rounds and other projectiles. “I could tell they were aiming these at the ground near people’s feet,” he wrote. Michalesko complied with police commands and continued to snap photos of the moving line from his stomach. “I also felt like the officers were at this point still too far away for me to face them and attempt to declare myself as press. I had already been hit once and didn’t want it to happen again,” he wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"f2ew5\">When he saw an officer nearby, he shouted, “I am a photojournalist with the Dallas Morning News. Don’t shoot!” He then asked if he could stand up and continue to take photographs. According to Michalesko’s recounting, the officer said yes, before adding the caveat, “But if I tell you to move, you need to move quick.”</p><p data-block-key=\"7h2b3\">Michalesko continued to work, filming and photographing the scene as police zip-tied protesters’ hands and lined them up. He observed members of the Dallas Police Department, state troopers from the Texas Department of Public Safety, National Guardsmen and FBI agents as protesters were being detained and processed.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Police have surrounded the protesters on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge and are arresting everyone. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/dallasnews?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@dallasnews</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/OtnOvPE6wl\">pic.twitter.com/OtnOvPE6wl</a></p>— Ryan Michalesko (@photosbylesko) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/photosbylesko/status/1267643703763623936?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 2, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"1zd1v\">Some 674 protesters on the bridge were cited with obstructing a freeway and released, the Dallas Morning News <a href=\"https://www.dallasnews.com/news/crime/2020/06/02/dallas-police-chief-renee-hall-says-demonstrators-broke-law-when-they-walked-onto-margaret-hunt-hill-bridge/\">reported</a>, but those charges were all later <a href=\"https://www.dallasnews.com/news/courts/2020/06/04/dallas-police-chief-renee-hall-says-protesters-who-marched-on-margaret-hunt-hill-bridge-will-not-be-charged/\">dropped</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"xw2o6\">When he returned home, Michalesko was able to inspect his bruise, describing it as “black, blue, and about the size of a baseball.” It remained sore for a full week, making sitting uncomfortable, he said.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Whatever you want to call it: rubber bullet, foam bullet, less-lethal ammunition. I was hit in the rear with this on the bridge Monday night as I was caught between the police line advancing from the west and protesters. It still hurts to sit. <a href=\"https://t.co/GgWzpzvh6y\">https://t.co/GgWzpzvh6y</a> <a href=\"https://t.co/IX9kqd1Tqu\">pic.twitter.com/IX9kqd1Tqu</a></p>— Ryan Michalesko (@photosbylesko) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/photosbylesko/status/1269073413030764544?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 6, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"nkux6\">A slideshow of Michalesko’s photos from the evening can be seen <a href=\"https://www.dallasnews.com/news/crime/2020/06/02/dallas-police-chief-renee-hall-says-demonstrators-broke-law-when-they-walked-onto-margaret-hunt-hill-bridge/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"i38l3\">Melinda Gutierrez, a spokesperson for the Dallas Police Department told the Tracker, “Not having specific details from the person involved and taking in to account the atmosphere, it’s challenging to provide a comment about an incident that is unfamiliar.” A spokesperson for the Texas Department of Public Safety wrote in an email that the agency “did not use any less lethal projectiles (e.g. rubber munition) during the protests on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge on June 1.” The Texas National Guard did not return an emailed request for comment as of press time.</p><p data-block-key=\"y3o5t\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country. Find<a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\"> these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Michalesko_assault_0601.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"rgfh2\">Police surround and detain hundreds of protesters on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge in Dallas, Texas on June 1, 2020. Dallas Morning News photojournalist Ryan Michalesko was hit with a projectile while reporting.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "no",
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"state": {
"name": "Texas",
"abbreviation": "TX"
},
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Ryan Michalesko (Dallas Morning News)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Photojournalist shot with projectile, camera destroyed amid Philadelphia protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-shot-projectile-camera-destroyed-amid-philadelphia-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-23T13:57:55.777166Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-04T17:50:06.321085Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-04T17:50:06.204404Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Philadelphia",
"longitude": -75.16362,
"latitude": 39.95238,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"t9wi1\">Independent photojournalist Joe Piette was shot by law enforcement officers with a projectile that injured his hand and destroyed his camera while covering protests in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"y6xcy\">Protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 have spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"4csd4\">Piette told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was photographing protesters as they poured onto the I-676 highway, halting traffic in both directions at around 5 p.m. Minutes later, Piette said, Philadelphia police began firing tear gas into the crowd.</p><p data-block-key=\"zo0q6\">“I was one of many people who ran up a grass embankment through a lot of gas fumes to street level,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"m6dbp\">Piette told the Tracker that once he was out of the gas, protesters helped pour water into his eyes and he crossed to the other side of the expressway, where there were very few people.</p><p data-block-key=\"bs8id\">“From that vantage point, I had a good view of police continuing to shoot [crowd-control munitions] at protesters as they tried to flee up an embankment and over a 10-foot-tall fence,” Piette said. “I took a few photos, and suddenly my camera was shot out of my hands and I felt a lot of pain in my right hand.”</p><p data-block-key=\"91yx3\">After looking at his photos the following day, Piette saw that his second-to-last image shows an officer on top of a tank approximately 20 feet from him. Piette told the Tracker that he assumes that is the officer who shot at him.</p><p data-block-key=\"ry7ay\">While Piette was not wearing any press identifiers, he told the Tracker that the officer had no cause to shoot at him, as he was standing away from the disturbance and with no other people around him.</p><p data-block-key=\"5h57f\">“The camera is totaled. The glass was shot out of the lens. The in-camera flash is stuck in the up position. When I turn on power, nothing happens,” Piette said.</p><p data-block-key=\"exnt5\">Piette told the Tracker that he went to the hospital to have his hand X-rayed. While it was not broken, he said that it was discolored, sore and swollen.</p><p data-block-key=\"opxgd\">“This is an attack on the press, a clear violation of the Constitution. I have a right, as every citizen does, to film and report on police activities, especially when the police are violating the rights of peaceful protesters,” Piette said.</p><p data-block-key=\"n4wo9\">In a late-night statement on June 1, Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw said that officers had no choice but to use tear gas after the protest turned violent, <a href=\"https://www.inquirer.com/news/george-floyd-protests-philadelphia-gas-police-vine-street-expressway-20200601.html\">according to</a> the Philadelphia Inquirer.</p><p data-block-key=\"9x2uc\">WHYY <a href=\"https://whyy.org/articles/philly-police-say-tear-gas-used-because-676-protest-turned-hostile-but-theres-no-evidence-that-happened/\">reported</a> that there does not appear to be evidence to support those claims.</p><p data-block-key=\"f4c2q\">Neither Mayor Kenney nor the Philadelphia Police Department responded to requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"sgc7u\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">these incidents here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Piette_assault_0601_PA.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"73lta\">Photojournalist Joe Piette captured this image of Pennsylvania police officers using crowd-control ammunition during a protest on June 1, 2020, moments before he was hit with one of the projectiles.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": "law enforcement",
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "unknown",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
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"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
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{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera"
}
],
"state": {
"name": "Pennsylvania",
"abbreviation": "PA"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Joe Piette (Freelance)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "KMTV journalists caught up in arrests in Omaha",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/kmtv-journalists-caught-arrests-omaha/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-22T04:13:18.149675Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:31:57.014497Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:31:56.922341Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Omaha",
"longitude": -95.94043,
"latitude": 41.25626,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"l4uue\">Jon Kipper, a reporter for CBS affiliate KMTV, was briefly detained by police in Omaha, Nebraska, as he covered a protest against police violence on June 1, 2020, Kipper said on <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267643253274431491\">social media</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"8kfvb\">Kipper was one of at least six journalists who were either detained, searched or aggressively confronted by law enforcement while covering the protest that evening, according to several journalists on the ground that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"97ukk\">For days, Omaha officials had struggled to respond to escalating protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 and spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"4ro1j\">Protesters once again gathered on June 1 after Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine announced that a white bar owner would not be charged in the fatal shooting of a 22-year-old Black man two days earlier, <a href=\"https://apnews.com/7551c8d603964e0e2cba3e2930e58f75\">according to The Associated Press</a>. Kleine said the bar owner had fired in self-defense.</p><p data-block-key=\"zf4bw\">Several hundred protesters peacefully engaged with police and National Guardsmen only a block away from the location of the bar shooting in the Old Market area, according to <a href=\"http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1221798/i-want-same-equality-protesters-speak-out-during-mostly-peaceful-night-omaha\">news reports</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"6105o\">Shortly before the city’s 8 p.m. curfew, Kipper shared a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267620300356759561\">photo</a> on Twitter of Deputy Police Chief Kanger kneeling with other law enforcement officers and protesters.</p><p data-block-key=\"gd83e\">Kanger then attempted to escort a large group of the remaining protesters out of the area so they could return home for curfew, <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/fourth-day-of-omaha-protests-brings-more-clashes-after-curfew-but-also-signs-of-unity/article_cc3bf57a-341b-53cb-b975-b525f4b61813.html#19\">according to the Omaha World-Herald</a>. But a water bottle was thrown, pepper balls were fired and the chaos of mass arrests quickly enveloped the block.</p><p data-block-key=\"r1j82\">In a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267630906442948608\">video</a> Kipper posted on Twitter, police can be seen making arrests amid a chaotic chorus of pepper ball shots, screams and shouts of “On the ground!” Kipper swings the camera to the left to show an advancing line of riot police.</p><p data-block-key=\"f9cb6\">“I’m media,” Kipper says to the approaching officers. He repeats it again, and then a third time even louder.</p><p data-block-key=\"l2ord\">“On the ground!” an officer orders Kipper, who appears to lower himself as the camera angle shifts. For a fourth and fifth time, Kipper says he’s media.</p><p data-block-key=\"21ig6\">The officer reaches out and suddenly the camera—and Kipper—tumble to the pavement. For a sixth time, Kipper yells that he’s media—this time with an expletive for emphasis. Then the video cuts out.</p><p data-block-key=\"bdi9p\">At the same time on the same block, two of Kipper’s colleagues were also nearly detained. Reporters <a href=\"https://twitter.com/Maya_Reports/status/1267633522807910400\">Maya Saenz</a> and <a href=\"https://twitter.com/KentLuetzen/status/1267638956801380353\">Kent Luetzen</a> both recorded videos of a National Guardsman apparently attempting to detain them.</p><p data-block-key=\"z2p5i\">In the videos, Luetzen repeatedly says, “We’re fine. We’re fine,” as law enforcement make arrests all around them. Suddenly, a National Guardsman grabs Luetzen. Both journalists repeatedly scream, “We are media! We are media!” before the guardsman disengages.</p><p data-block-key=\"39h09\">Saenz films a protester shrieking as a police officer brings them into custody. Another officer screams, “Get out!” at the journalists. They then weave around several protesters on the ground in an attempt to find safety.</p><p data-block-key=\"3t6yr\">“OK, I think it’s time to go,” Saenz says in the video after leaving the block.</p><p data-block-key=\"heuld\">Both Kipper and Saenz were wearing polo shirts with a KMTV logo. It is not clear from the footage whether Luentzen was also displaying the logo.</p><p data-block-key=\"u7v2u\">Kipper said on <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267643455469244417\">Twitter</a> he was released after an officer took him to the side of the action and confirmed his profession.</p><p data-block-key=\"9xcdp\">At least three other journalists were caught up in the police action as well, including two who were briefly detained. The Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"7yoor\">The incidents occurred despite the curfew explicitly excluding “members of the media.” As police waited to transport the arrested protesters, they asked members of the media to <a href=\"https://twitter.com/MikeSautterOWH/status/1267636031047831553\">leave the area</a>, World-Herald reporter Mike Sautter told the Tracker. The block was “like a crime scene,” the police said.</p><p data-block-key=\"8q703\">The detained journalists were eventually released.</p><p data-block-key=\"kxbxa\">Lieutenant Sherie Thomas, a spokesperson for the Omaha Police Department, told the Tracker that Police Chief Todd Schmaderer had ordered “an overall review of the protests.” Thomas later said that the department sent “clear communication” to news outlets “to make sure employees had visible badges showing that they work for the media” and to “wear highly visible vests.”</p><p data-block-key=\"b43nf\">Major Scott Ingalsbe, a spokesperson for the Nebraska National Guard, told the Tracker, “Once National Guardsmen and law enforcement were able to quickly and correctly identify members of the news media, they were released without arrest.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2z0fh\">“We appreciate the work journalists do and the service they provide to our community,” Ingalsbe said. He added that he had personally reached out to KMTV and other outlets covering the protests and has yet to hear any indications the National Guard harmed them or interfered with their work.</p><p data-block-key=\"oppta\">Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert did not respond to request for comment. The KMTV journalists also did not respond to requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"dwi1t\">Two days after the protest, the prosecutor reversed course on the shooting case, according to <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/veteran-federal-prosecutor-to-lead-grand-jury-probe-into-james-scurlocks-death/article_f2f0f66d-8400-5923-b441-d2f490c512c7.html\">news reports</a>. A grand jury would review the case after all.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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{
"title": "Police search journalist’s bag and detain three other journalists in Omaha",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/police-search-journalists-bag-and-arrest-three-other-journalists-in-omaha/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-22T04:01:09.911258Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:31:34.759002Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:31:34.663542Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Omaha",
"longitude": -95.94043,
"latitude": 41.25626,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"tq4us\">A member of the Sarpy County Sheriff’s Office searched the bag of Omaha World-Herald reporter Reece Ristau as he covered a protest against police violence in Omaha, Nebraska, on June 1, 2020, Ristau told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"9z8rv\">Ristau was one of at least six journalists who were either detained, searched or aggressively confronted by law enforcement while covering the protest that evening, according to several journalists on the ground that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"5y20l\">For days, Omaha officials had struggled to respond to escalating protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 and spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"si153\">Protesters once again gathered on June 1 after Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine announced that a white bar owner would not be charged in the fatal shooting of a 22-year-old Black man two days earlier, <a href=\"https://apnews.com/7551c8d603964e0e2cba3e2930e58f75\">according to The Associated Press</a>. Kleine said the bar owner had fired in self-defense.</p><p data-block-key=\"9ggm6\">Several hundred protesters peacefully engaged with police and National Guardsmen only a block away from the location of the bar shooting in the Old Market area, according to <a href=\"http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1221798/i-want-same-equality-protesters-speak-out-during-mostly-peaceful-night-omaha\">news reports</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"yh208\">After protesters and law enforcement took a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267620300356759561\">knee together</a>, Deputy Police Chief Ken Kanger attempted to escort a large group of the remaining protesters out of the area so they could return home for the city’s curfew, <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/fourth-day-of-omaha-protests-brings-more-clashes-after-curfew-but-also-signs-of-unity/article_cc3bf57a-341b-53cb-b975-b525f4b61813.html#19\">according to the Omaha World-Herald</a>. But a water bottle was thrown, pepper balls were fired and the chaos of mass arrests quickly enveloped the block.</p><p data-block-key=\"3mv7l\">Ristau told the Tracker that when he saw officers don gas masks, he put on his orange vest and safety glasses. With a large press badge around his neck, Ristau began filming arrests.</p><p data-block-key=\"0y2xr\">“Once the first pepper balls were fired, things moved quickly,” Ristau said.</p><p data-block-key=\"86soh\">In a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/reecereports/status/1267629669093978117\">video</a> Ristau posted to his social media, a police officer kicks, punches and stomps on a protester struggling on the ground with two National Guardsmen. Ristau continues to film as he walks into the crowd of arrested protesters. Crying and coughing can be heard over the ratcheting of zip ties. An officer then warns Ristau in the video to “Back it up.”</p><p data-block-key=\"ebghg\">Shortly thereafter, a Sarpy County Sheriff officer tapped Ristau on the shoulder and said he needed to search Ristau’s backpack, Ristau told the Tracker. Ristau said he was unsure of the officer’s rank.</p><p data-block-key=\"yrvtk\">Ristau showed his press badge and said he did not consent to a search. But the officer insisted and threatened to jail Ristau if he did not comply, Ristau said.</p><p data-block-key=\"y55ok\">Out of the corner of his eye, Ristau noticed his colleague Anna Reed focus her camera in his direction, he said. Her <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/fourth-day-of-omaha-protests-brings-more-clashes-after-curfew-but-also-signs-of-unity/article_cc3bf57a-341b-53cb-b975-b525f4b61813.html\">photo</a> of the search shows Ristau in safety goggles, mask and bright orange vest holding his backpack in front of the officer equipped in riot gear, plastic restraints hanging at the ready.</p><p data-block-key=\"atncp\">Without Ristau’s consent, the officer searched through Ristau’s bag. Ristau said the officer did not ask to search his phone or question him about his reporting.</p><p data-block-key=\"s2ewu\">At least five other journalists were caught up in the police action as well, including three who were briefly detained. The Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"0aj7k\">The incidents occurred despite the curfew explicitly excluding “members of the media.” As police waited to transport the arrested protesters, they asked members of the media to <a href=\"https://twitter.com/MikeSautterOWH/status/1267636031047831553\">leave the area</a>, World-Herald reporter Mike Sautter told the Tracker. The block was “like a crime scene,” the police said.</p><p data-block-key=\"zs1a4\">The detained journalists were eventually released.</p><p data-block-key=\"gbaaz\">Ristau said that his paper’s executive editor, Randy Essex, complained about the search to the Omaha mayor, Jean Stothert, and law enforcement officials.</p><p data-block-key=\"uv661\">Sarpy County Sheriff Chief Deputy Greg London refused to respond to questions about the search of Ristau’s bag.</p><p data-block-key=\"ab7b5\">“Just like a journalist, I’d be extremely remiss if I responded to secondhand information that I haven’t verified,” he said, adding that Ristau can file a formal complaint or contact him if he felt mistreated.</p><p data-block-key=\"ph643\">Lieutenant Sherie Thomas, a spokesperson for the Omaha Police Department, told the Tracker that Police Chief Todd Schmaderer had ordered “an overall review of the protests.” Thomas later said that the department sent “clear communication” to news outlets “to make sure employees had visible badges showing that they work for the media” and to “wear highly visible vests.”</p><p data-block-key=\"mmklh\">Major Scott Ingalsbe, a spokesperson for the Nebraska National Guard, told the Tracker, “Once National Guardsmen and law enforcement were able to quickly and correctly identify members of the news media, they were released without arrest.”</p><p data-block-key=\"nun2f\">“We appreciate the work journalists do and the service they provide to our community,” Ingalsbe said. He added that he had personally reached out to outlets covering the protests and has yet to hear any indications the National Guard harmed them or interfered with their work.</p><p data-block-key=\"21sl9\">Mayor Stothert did not respond to request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"xgid9\">Two days after the protest, the prosecutor reversed course on the shooting case, according to <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/veteran-federal-prosecutor-to-lead-grand-jury-probe-into-james-scurlocks-death/article_f2f0f66d-8400-5923-b441-d2f490c512c7.html\">news reports</a>. A grand jury would review the case after all.</p><p data-block-key=\"g5shb\"><i>The headline of this article was updated to emphasize the journalists were detained, not arrested.</i></p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"5y82t\">A member of the Sarpy County Sheriff’s Office searches the bag of Omaha World-Herald reporter Reece Ristau on June 1, 2020, in Omaha, Nebraska.</p>",
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}
],
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"state": {
"name": "Nebraska",
"abbreviation": "NE"
},
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"case_statuses": [],
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"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Equipment Search or Seizure"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Reece Ristau (Omaha World-Herald)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Freelance journalist caught up in a wave of arrests in Omaha",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-journalist-caught-wave-arrests-omaha/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-22T03:53:01.303842Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:31:07.870971Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:31:07.741879Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Omaha",
"longitude": -95.94043,
"latitude": 41.25626,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"euqlw\">Freelance reporter Megan Feeney was briefly detained by police in Omaha, Nebraska, as she covered a protest against police violence on June 1, 2020, she told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"ua28p\">Feeney was on assignment for public outlets NET News and America Amplified, she wrote in an <a href=\"http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1221798/i-want-same-equality-protesters-speak-out-during-mostly-peaceful-night-omaha\">article</a> for NET News, home to Nebraska’s PBS and NPR stations.</p><p data-block-key=\"ebppp\">Feeney was one of at least six journalists who were either detained, searched or aggressively confronted by law enforcement while covering the protest that evening, according to several journalists on the ground that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"mkz3w\">For days, Omaha officials had struggled to respond to escalating protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 and spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"y1ep3\">Protesters once again gathered on June 1 after Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine announced that a white bar owner would not be charged in the fatal shooting of a 22-year-old Black man two days earlier, <a href=\"https://apnews.com/7551c8d603964e0e2cba3e2930e58f75\">according to The Associated Press</a>. Kleine said the bar owner had fired in self-defense.</p><p data-block-key=\"xd5zt\">Several hundred protesters peacefully engaged with police and National Guardsmen only a block away from the location of the bar shooting in the Old Market area, according to <a href=\"http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1221798/i-want-same-equality-protesters-speak-out-during-mostly-peaceful-night-omaha\">news reports</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"zgk3d\">After protesters and law enforcement took a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267620300356759561\">knee together</a>, Deputy Police Chief Ken Kanger attempted to escort a large group of the remaining protesters out of the area so they could return home for the city’s 8 p.m. curfew, <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/fourth-day-of-omaha-protests-brings-more-clashes-after-curfew-but-also-signs-of-unity/article_cc3bf57a-341b-53cb-b975-b525f4b61813.html#19\">according to the Omaha World-Herald</a>. But a water bottle was thrown, pepper balls were fired and the chaos of mass arrests quickly enveloped the block.</p><p data-block-key=\"4j6rv\">Despite the media exemption to the curfew, Feeney knew she risked being detained for continuing to report past 8 p.m., she told the Tracker. She was especially at risk as a freelancer without credentials.</p><p data-block-key=\"d5cz5\">“I felt the need to witness what happened next despite the consequences,” she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"7th0y\">Feeney was not the only journalist who faced consequences for continuing to report past curfew. At least five other journalists were caught up in the police action as well, including two who were briefly detained. The Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"vsja7\">The incidents occurred despite the curfew explicitly excluding “members of the media.” As police waited to transport the arrested protesters, they asked members of the media to <a href=\"https://twitter.com/MikeSautterOWH/status/1267636031047831553\">leave the area</a>, World-Herald reporter Mike Sautter told the Tracker. The block was “like a crime scene,” the police said.</p><p data-block-key=\"i2hnj\">In videos by KMTV’s <a href=\"https://twitter.com/KentLuetzen/status/1267647419568869377\">Kent Luetzen</a>, who was nearly <a href=\"https://twitter.com/KentLuetzen/status/1267638956801380353\">detained</a> himself, and Omaha World-Herald’s <a href=\"https://twitter.com/asanderford/status/1267628919290814464\">Aaron Sanderford</a>, a police officer <a href=\"https://twitter.com/asanderford/status/1267632400378597376\">escorts</a> Feeney down the street. Feeney is wearing a yellow reflective vest with “PRESS” written on the front. She identifies as a freelancer for NET News and America Amplified, a microphone resting on her hip and a camera dangling from her zip-tied hands.</p><p data-block-key=\"8ou8j\">Feeney was escorted to a hot police van holding other people in custody, she wrote for NET News. She told the Tracker, “I had no way of verifying to the arresting officer that I was media other than my word.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cb3kk\">NET News learned of her detention on Twitter and contacted Omaha police, Feeney said. Michael Pecha, a public information officer for the Omaha police, <a href=\"https://twitter.com/OPDOfcPecha/status/1267636725905588229\">tweeted</a> just before 9 p.m. that another officer, Joseph Nickerson, was on his way “to sort this out.”</p><p data-block-key=\"m3n7w\">The detained journalists, including Feeney, were eventually released.</p><p data-block-key=\"ggusq\">Lieutenant Sherie Thomas, a spokesperson for the Omaha Police Department, told the Tracker that Police Chief Todd Schmaderer had ordered “an overall review of the protests.” Thomas later said that the department sent “clear communication” to news outlets “to make sure employees had visible badges showing that they work for the media” and to “wear highly visible vests.”</p><p data-block-key=\"xurul\">Major Scott Ingalsbe, a spokesperson for the Nebraska National Guard, told the Tracker, “Once National Guardsmen and law enforcement were able to quickly and correctly identify members of the news media, they were released without arrest.”</p><p data-block-key=\"ftnfw\">“We appreciate the work journalists do and the service they provide to our community,” Ingalsbe said. He added that he had personally reached out to outlets covering the protests and has yet to hear any indications the National Guard harmed them or interfered with their work.</p><p data-block-key=\"32e7w\">Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert did not respond to request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"wlapa\">Two days after the protest, the prosecutor reversed course on the shooting case, according to <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/veteran-federal-prosecutor-to-lead-grand-jury-probe-into-james-scurlocks-death/article_f2f0f66d-8400-5923-b441-d2f490c512c7.html\">news reports</a>. A grand jury would review the case after all.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"qxmvw\">An Omaha police officer escorts freelancer Megan Feeney, a camera dangling from her zip-tied hands, on June 1, 2020.</p>",
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},
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],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist detained by Omaha police for covering protests after curfew",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-one-three-detained-omaha-police-covering-protests-after-curfew/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-20T13:40:14.226105Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:30:43.991039Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:30:43.892283Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Omaha",
"longitude": -95.94043,
"latitude": 41.25626,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"hpml1\">Michelle Renne Leach, a freelance journalist on assignment for the Daily Beast, was briefly detained by police in Omaha, Nebraska, while covering a protest against police violence on June 1, 2020, she told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"xb2wb\">Leach was one of at least six journalists who were either detained, searched or aggressively confronted by law enforcement while covering the protest that evening, according to several journalists on the ground that night.</p><p data-block-key=\"e58y1\">For days, Omaha officials had struggled to respond to escalating protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 and spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"mm7q3\">Protesters once again gathered on June 1 after Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine announced that a white bar owner would not be charged in the fatal shooting of a 22-year-old black man two days earlier, <a href=\"https://apnews.com/7551c8d603964e0e2cba3e2930e58f75\">according to The Associated Press</a>. Kleine said the bar owner had fired in self-defense.</p><p data-block-key=\"eqdpq\">The Daily Beast had contacted Leach to report on the developing story, she told the Tracker. When she arrived at the protest, Leach found a calm scene. But things escalated quickly as an 8 p.m. <a href=\"https://www.cityofomaha.org/latest-news/637-citywide-curfew-begins-at-8-00-p-m-may-31#:~:text=A%20curfew%20is%20imposed%20from,park%20or%20other%20public%20place.\">curfew</a> drew close, she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"e67va\">Several hundred protesters peacefully engaged with police and National Guardsmen only a block away from the location of the bar shooting in the Old Market area, according to <a href=\"http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1221798/i-want-same-equality-protesters-speak-out-during-mostly-peaceful-night-omaha\">news reports</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"spumn\">After protesters and law enforcement took a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jonnykip21/status/1267620300356759561\">knee together</a>, Deputy Police Chief Ken Kanger attempted to escort a large group of the remaining protesters out of the area so they could return home for curfew, <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/fourth-day-of-omaha-protests-brings-more-clashes-after-curfew-but-also-signs-of-unity/article_cc3bf57a-341b-53cb-b975-b525f4b61813.html#19\">according to the Omaha World-Herald</a>. But a water bottle was thrown, pepper balls were fired and the chaos of mass arrests quickly enveloped the block.</p><p data-block-key=\"734l5\">Leach told the Tracker she captured an <a href=\"https://www.thedailybeast.com/omaha-bar-owner-jake-gardner-held-in-shooting-of-black-protester-james-scurlock-has-gun-arrests?ref=author\">image</a> of police cuffing a kneeling protester right before she, too, was detained. She said one of the arresting officers knew she was a journalist because she had talked to him earlier to get estimates of the number of protesters and officers.</p><p data-block-key=\"qreji\">“I was just confused that I was even being arrested because he knew I was just trying to do my job,” Leach said.</p><p data-block-key=\"z27gz\">The police cuffed Leach in plastic restraints and placed her phone and notebook into her bag. She said at least two officers then led her to a fenced area across the street where they were holding others in custody. They then searched her belongings.</p><p data-block-key=\"27p3x\">Leach repeatedly insisted she was a journalist throughout her detention and search of her belongings.</p><p data-block-key=\"6ts0m\">At least five other journalists were caught up in the police action as well. The Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"yxsxj\">The incidents occurred despite the curfew explicitly excluding "members of the media.” As police waited to transport the arrested protesters, they asked members of the media to <a href=\"https://twitter.com/MikeSautterOWH/status/1267636031047831553\">leave the area</a>, World-Herald reporter Mike Sautter told the Tracker. The block was “like a crime scene,” the police said.</p><p data-block-key=\"bcvoj\">The detained journalists, including Leach, were eventually released.</p><p data-block-key=\"6y09w\">Police took Leach away from the other protesters to investigate whether she was a journalist, she told the Tracker. She did not have press credentials.</p><p data-block-key=\"2qgih\">“I don’t know how much it really would have mattered,” she said, citing the treatment of the other journalists. “The onus really fell on me to show them all of my work and prove who I was.”</p><p data-block-key=\"rw0qu\">After examining Leach’s online portfolio, officers found a National Guardsman to cut off her restraints, she said. The officers told her to hold onto them and gave her a slip of paper to show to any other law enforcement official who might try to arrest her for a curfew violation as she returned home.</p><p data-block-key=\"osjku\">Leach said that only upon returning home, her hands tingling and numb, did she realize how tight the restraints had been tied.</p><p data-block-key=\"rfoiz\">Lieutenant Sherie Thomas, a spokesperson for the Omaha Police Department, told the Tracker that Police Chief Todd Schmaderer had ordered “an overall review of the protests.” Thomas later said that the department sent "clear communication" to news outlets "to make sure employees had visible badges showing that they work for the media" and to "wear highly visible vests."</p><p data-block-key=\"x30cb\">Major Scott Ingalsbe, a spokesperson for the Nebraska National Guard, told the Tracker, “Once National Guardsmen and law enforcement were able to quickly and correctly identify members of the news media, they were released without arrest.”</p><p data-block-key=\"mvnjz\">"We appreciate the work journalists do and the service they provide to our community," Ingalsbe said. He added that he had personally reached out to outlets covering the protests and has yet to hear any indications the National Guard harmed them or interfered with their work.</p><p data-block-key=\"49npp\">Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert did not respond to request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"00d78\">Two days after the protest, the prosecutor reversed course on the shooting case, according to <a href=\"https://www.omaha.com/news/local/veteran-federal-prosecutor-to-lead-grand-jury-probe-into-james-scurlocks-death/article_f2f0f66d-8400-5923-b441-d2f490c512c7.html\">news reports</a>. A grand jury would review the case after all.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"n3igs\">Freelance journalist Michelle Renne Leach reports on anti-police violence protests in Omaha, Nebraska, on June 1, 2020, before being detained later in the day.</p>",
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{
"title": "Freelance journalist says police targeted him with projectiles after he identified himself as press",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-journalist-says-police-targeted-him-projectiles-after-he-identified-himself-press/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-18T16:29:41.021003Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:30:15.239338Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:30:15.147355Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
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"city": "Worcester",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"nu4t0\">Police shot projectiles at freelance journalist Sam Bishop after he identified himself as press to officers while covering a protest in Worcester, Massachusetts on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"osgle\">Protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"aika3\">Bishop, who has produced work for The Daily Dot and Patch.com, was <a href=\"https://twitter.com/sebishop99/status/1267882265318735875\">recording protests</a> on his Twitter page. He told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the scene grew tense when police in riot gear began arresting protesters and dispersing the crowd using pepper spray and projectiles, interrupting what he described as a peaceful demonstration up until that point.</p><p data-block-key=\"c33kf\">A Worcester Police Department <a href=\"http://www.worcesterma.gov/police/press-releases/nineteen-arrested-on-main-st-after-police-pelted-with-rocks-roman-candles#id7zYsc_Ax7k_lfV_9XVPvxw\">press release</a> says that officers began to use “less-lethal measures including smoke grenades and pepperball rounds” after people in the crowd targeted them.</p><p data-block-key=\"nd84t\">As the protest thinned out, he said, police continued to shoot tear gas and projectiles and people threw tear gas canisters and rocks at the police. Bishop said he identified himself as a member of the press to a sergeant who assured him that he would not be attacked or targeted as long as he was not breaking the law.</p><p data-block-key=\"hwuma\">“At this point, most of the crowd was about maybe 300 yards back from the riot squad officers when I went up to them,” Bishop told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"kog4w\">Bishop stood away from the crowd to avoid projectiles when he said an officer, who was standing close to the sergeant he had spoken with, started shooting at him with projectiles. He believes the officer overheard him seeking assurances from his colleague, and was deliberately targeting him.</p><p data-block-key=\"opvht\">“As I'm going back, probably off to the side from the main street, I'm up on the sidewalk, it's clear, I'm alone, there's nobody else near me,” Bishop said. “And then suddenly, I can see in front of me, and I guess kind of behind me the pavement being chipped off from the roadway [from the force of the projectiles].”</p><p data-block-key=\"7b6tq\">“I'm close enough that he can clearly see who I am, and I can see who he is,” said Bishop, who said he was wearing press identification.</p><p data-block-key=\"8dnjz\">Bishop said he moved back into the crowd to avoid being singled out by the police again. Inside the crowd, he was exposed to tear gas, which later caused him to develop a skin rash.</p><p data-block-key=\"mfuex\">“For a couple days after what happened my face was blistered off,” Bishop said. “I don't know if it was tear gas burns or some kind of allergic reaction, but my forehead and the base of my nose was really just like red and kind of burned.”</p><p data-block-key=\"jcg95\">The Tracker contacted the Worcester Police Department to ask about the incident and the projectiles used. In response, a representative clarified that the department does not use rubber bullets. The representative did not immediately respond to follow up questions about Bishop’s other claims, but directed the Tracker to its <a href=\"http://www.worcesterma.gov/police/press-releases/nineteen-arrested-on-main-st-after-police-pelted-with-rocks-roman-candles#id7zYsc_Ax7k_lfV_9XVPvxw\">press release</a> detailing the department’s version of the night’s events.</p><p data-block-key=\"m1vg8\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd while in police custody. <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">Find these cases here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"4r9o2\"><i>In a response to request for additional comment, the Worcester Police Department guided the Tracker to its press release. This article has been updated to reflect that release.</i></p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"hrblu\">After being targeted by police with projectiles on June 1 in Worcester, Massachusetts, journalist Sam Bishop says he retreated into the crowd, only to have a chemical reaction after tear gas was used.</p>",
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{
"title": "News Journal reporter one of three journalists detained by Philadelphia police past curfew",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/news-journal-reporter-one-three-journalists-detained-philadelphia-police-past-curfew/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-17T03:18:59.123553Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:29:49.989853Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:29:49.883308Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
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"city": "Philadelphia",
"longitude": -75.16362,
"latitude": 39.95238,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"q9601\">Two journalists working for Wilmington’s The News Journal and Delaware Online were temporarily detained on June 1, 2020, the outlet <a href=\"https://www.delawareonline.com/story/opinion/editorials/2020/06/02/reporters-must-not-charged-detained-they-cover-protests-editorial/3123063001/\">reported</a>. Philadelphia police arrested reporter Jeff Neiburg and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/news-journal-photographer-one-three-journalists-detained-philadelphia-police-past-curfew/\">photographer Jenna Miller</a> as they returned home from reporting around 7 p.m., after the 6 p.m. curfew, Miller <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jennamargaretta/status/1267629476034146304\">said in a tweet</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"nv52u\">A third journalist was similarly detained that night in Philadelphia. Kristen Graham, a reporter for the daily Philadelphia Inquirer, was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/philadelphia-inquirer-reporter-one-three-journalists-detained-police-past-curfew/\">also arrested</a> by police as she attempted to return to her car soon after the curfew, the paper <a href=\"https://www.inquirer.com/news/live/philadelphia-protest-curfew-news-live-george-floyd-minneapolis-looting-stores-police-20200602.html\">reported</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"33i3h\">Their respective outlets said the three journalists were reporting on protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 and spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"yzkir\">As the curfew set in by 6 p.m. and the protesters dispersed, Miller and Neiburg decided to go home and file their reporting, Neiburg said in an <a href=\"https://975thefanatic.com/episodes/delware-onlines-jeff-neiburg-breaks-down-the-protests/\">interview</a> with the local radio station 97.5 The Fanatic. Miller’s bike was parked near police headquarters, so they headed in that direction.</p><p data-block-key=\"w3xwn\">They asked a police officer how to get there safely, who instructed the journalists to walk around the south side of City Hall, Neiburg said in the radio interview. As they walked, they saw police officers arresting people.</p><p data-block-key=\"dc2lk\">The journalists held their press credentials in the air, Neiburg said in the radio interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"r1dt4\">“They’re going to round you up, they’re going to round you up,” a group of officers warned the journalists. One of the police officers started to escort Miller and Neiburg out of concern they would be arrested, Neiburg said in the radio interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"1r3s2\">But two other officers interceded and overruled her, Neiburg said. The journalists were to be detained.</p><p data-block-key=\"1yv2s\">Miller said in a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jennamargaretta/status/1267629476034146304\">tweet</a> after her release that they repeatedly identified themselves as journalists and showed their press credentials. But officers claimed they were under orders to detain everyone.</p><p data-block-key=\"ctrf1\">“I don’t believe you,” one officer told the journalists, in reference to their press credentials, according to <a href=\"https://www.delawareonline.com/story/opinion/editorials/2020/06/02/reporters-must-not-charged-detained-they-cover-protests-editorial/3123063001/\">Neiburg</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"c7ztv\">Miller and Neiburg were placed in plastic restraints and escorted to gender segregated buses, Neiburg said in the radio interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"gqvuf\">Graham wrote in her account for the Inquirer that she was also arrested near City Hall and brought to an empty bus that soon was filled with more than 20 women, including Miller from The News Journal. The journalists, with the other detainees, were then driven to the 22nd District Headquarters.</p><p data-block-key=\"glvzk\">For two hours, the journalists remained on the buses, their outlets reported. In her Inquirer account, Graham described how the buses were not air conditioned and one woman urinated herself after not being allowed to use the bathroom. Another woman had a medical emergency and was eventually taken to receive medical care.</p><p data-block-key=\"rupgv\">An officer informed the detainees on Graham and Miller’s bus they would be issued citations for violating the curfew and released by the end of the night, both journalists <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jennamargaretta/status/1267635481317183488\">said</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"youq3\">Graham wrote in the Inquirer that she was eventually able to maneuver her hands in order to send texts to her husband and editor on her smartwatch. A lawyer for the Inquirer contacted city officials. Around 9 p.m., the journalists were released without charge but with an apology from officials.</p><p data-block-key=\"y5xch\">City spokesperson Mike Dunn told the Tracker that Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney is “extremely troubled” by the detentions and has called some of the journalists. Both Mayor Kenney and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw “are strongly committed to allowing press access so the public can be fully informed,” Dunn said.</p><p data-block-key=\"swtgk\">Toward that end, Dunn said Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw ordered an investigation into the detentions. And police protocols that ensure “properly credentialed press are essential workers and not subject to restrictions of a curfew, as long as they are not impeding public safety or police operations […] have been reiterated repeatedly in internal communications to officers.”</p><p data-block-key=\"wplq6\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd. Find all of these cases <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\"> here</a>.</p></div>",
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"state": {
"name": "Pennsylvania",
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},
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"tags": [
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"protest"
],
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"categories": [
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},
{
"title": "News Journal photographer one of three journalists detained by Philadelphia police past curfew",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/news-journal-photographer-one-three-journalists-detained-philadelphia-police-past-curfew/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-17T03:06:19.728001Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:29:21.344307Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:29:21.263865Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Philadelphia",
"longitude": -75.16362,
"latitude": 39.95238,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"fo5gr\">Two journalists working for Wilmington’s The News Journal and Delaware Online were temporarily detained on June 1, 2020, the outlet <a href=\"https://www.delawareonline.com/story/opinion/editorials/2020/06/02/reporters-must-not-charged-detained-they-cover-protests-editorial/3123063001/\">reported</a>. Philadelphia police arrested photographer Jenna Miller and reporter Jeff Neiburg as they returned home from reporting around 7 p.m., after the 6 p.m. curfew, Miller <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jennamargaretta/status/1267629476034146304\">said in a tweet</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"gnysb\">A third journalist was similarly detained that night in Philadelphia. Kristen Graham, a reporter for the daily Philadelphia Inquirer, was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/philadelphia-inquirer-reporter-one-three-journalists-detained-police-past-curfew/\">also arrested by police</a> as she attempted to return to her car soon after the curfew, the paper <a href=\"https://www.inquirer.com/news/live/philadelphia-protest-curfew-news-live-george-floyd-minneapolis-looting-stores-police-20200602.html\">reported</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"w9uln\">Their respective outlets said the three journalists were reporting on protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 and spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"6eem7\">After the curfew set in by 6 p.m. and the protesters dispersed, Miller and Neiburg decided to go home and file their reporting, Neiburg said in an <a href=\"https://975thefanatic.com/episodes/delware-onlines-jeff-neiburg-breaks-down-the-protests/\">interview</a> with the local radio station 97.5 The Fanatic. Miller’s bike was parked near police headquarters, so they headed in that direction.</p><p data-block-key=\"cudy9\">They asked a police officer how to get there safely, who instructed the journalists to walk around the south side of City Hall, Neiburg said in the radio interview. As they walked, they saw police officers arresting people.</p><p data-block-key=\"m31sy\">The journalists held their press credentials in the air, Neiburg said in the radio interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"608uo\">“They’re going to round you up, they’re going to round you up,” a group of officers warned the journalists. One of the police officers started to escort Miller and Neiburg out of concern they would be arrested, Neiburg said in the radio interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"6v1ss\">But two other officers interceded and overruled her, Neiburg said. The journalists were to be detained.</p><p data-block-key=\"sfu18\">Miller said in a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jennamargaretta/status/1267629476034146304\">tweet</a> after her release that they repeatedly identified themselves as journalists and showed their press credentials. But officers claimed they were under orders to detain everyone.</p><p data-block-key=\"mbowp\">“I don’t believe you,” one officer told the journalists, in reference to their press credentials, according to <a href=\"https://www.delawareonline.com/story/opinion/editorials/2020/06/02/reporters-must-not-charged-detained-they-cover-protests-editorial/3123063001/\">Neiburg</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"nlsi8\">Miller and Neiburg were placed in plastic restraints and escorted to gender segregated buses, Neiburg said in the radio interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"ka1k7\">Graham wrote in her account for the Inquirer that she was also arrested near City Hall and brought to an empty bus that soon was filled with more than 20 women, including Miller from The News Journal. The journalists, with the other detainees, were then driven to the 22nd District Headquarters.</p><p data-block-key=\"acrg5\">For two hours, the journalists remained on the buses, their outlets reported. In her Inquirer account, Graham described how the buses were not air conditioned and one woman urinated herself after not being allowed to use the bathroom. Another woman had a medical emergency and was eventually taken to receive medical care.</p><p data-block-key=\"qvisw\">An officer informed the detainees on Graham and Miller’s bus they would be issued citations for violating the curfew and released by the end of the night, both journalists <a href=\"https://twitter.com/jennamargaretta/status/1267635481317183488\">said</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"0ufnv\">Graham wrote in the Inquirer that she was eventually able to maneuver her hands in order to send texts to her husband and editor on her smartwatch. A lawyer for the Inquirer contacted city officials. Around 9 p.m., the journalists were released without charge but with an apology from officials.</p><p data-block-key=\"3oib5\">City spokesperson Mike Dunn told the Tracker that Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney is “extremely troubled” by the detentions and has called some of the journalists. Both Mayor Kenney and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw “are strongly committed to allowing press access so the public can be fully informed,” Dunn said.</p><p data-block-key=\"c7ctq\">Toward that end, Dunn said Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw ordered an investigation into the detentions. And police protocols that ensure “properly credentialed press are essential workers and not subject to restrictions of a curfew, as long as they are not impeding public safety or police operations […] have been reiterated repeatedly in internal communications to officers.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3dkt7\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd. Find all of these cases <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\"> here</a>.</p></div>",
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"name": "Pennsylvania",
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"tags": [
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"protest"
],
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"categories": [
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"targeted_journalists": [
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},
{
"title": "Atlanta photographer detained, released after intervention by other journalists",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/atlanta-photographer-detained-released-after-intervention-other-journalists/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-16T13:50:58.737920Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-07-15T13:40:58.281697Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-07-15T13:40:58.161587Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Atlanta",
"longitude": -84.38798,
"latitude": 33.749,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"2jm7h\">Officers from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources temporarily <a href=\"https://www.ajc.com/news/state--regional/groups-condemn-detention-journalists-covering-atlanta-protests/ki7s5LUHU1n3dPLQgYN5aK/\">detained</a> Atlanta Journal-Constitution photographer Alyssa Pointer as she covered protests in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"pfofu\">Protests that began in Minnesota on May 26 spread across the country, sparked by a video showing a police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a black man, during an arrest the day before. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"19his\">Pointer told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she’d been following a group of <a href=\"https://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta-protests-crowds-gather-downtown-4th-day-demonstrations-continue/sSoUsu5ugM3nbuSkzBgXNO/\">protesters</a> marching near City Hall when she realized they intended to try to get on the interstate south of the state Capitol. She heard an officer instruct others to arrest any protester who tried to go down an embankment toward the interstate, she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"4kcf9\">As the Georgia State Patrol began to make arrests, Pointer said she continued to photograph the scene. After she captured the arrest of two young women, an officer from the DNR demanded to know what she was doing.</p><p data-block-key=\"pplib\">The department, which usually provides law enforcement for outdoor recreation, was one of several state and local agencies assisting the Atlanta Police Department that day, DNR spokesperson Mark McKinnon told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"2rnz0\">Pointer responded that she was a journalist with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and said she was heading back up the embankment. Pointer’s press badge hung clearly visible around her neck, she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"zb9hu\">“I don’t care. You’re being detained,” the DNR officer said, according to Pointer. Two other officers followed that order and proceeded to detain her.</p><p data-block-key=\"0er0u\">McKinnon said that two Atlanta Police Department officers told DNR officers to arrest everyone in the area where protesters were blocking traffic on the highway. DNR officers detained Pointer as part of that group.</p><p data-block-key=\"xm2m7\">Pointer told the Tracker that the officers were not able to handcuff her due to all of her equipment. So they took her two cameras and backpack and placed her in plastic restraints. They then hung her cameras around her neck.</p><p data-block-key=\"fylj1\">Journalists walking among the protesters found Pointer sitting with her back against the support of an underpass surrounded by several DNR officers. In a <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/tvnewsgoon/videos/564953394445546/?v=564953394445546\">livestream video</a> by NBC affiliate 11Alive, reporter Doug Richards spots Pointer and asks, “Whoa, is that Alyssa?”</p><p data-block-key=\"bwzl7\">Two other journalists were already filming Pointer and talking to the officers. “She’s with the AJC!” Richards shouts in the video. A DNR officer responds that he did not know who detained her or why.</p><p data-block-key=\"xgcwn\">“It’s as if the story of these guys is that someone cuffed her and then walked away,” Richards explains to his livestream audience.</p><p data-block-key=\"vyz17\">A DNR officer, seeing Pointer’s press badge, asked her who detained her. She said she did not know, because the initial officer had left after giving the order. An officer then left to search for his colleague, she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"po5v3\">Pointer told the Tracker that one officer offered to write down a phone number for her to call once she was taken to jail. “I kept telling him I’m not going,” Pointer said, repeating that she was a journalist. “But they weren’t listening.”</p><p data-block-key=\"dxk5l\">McKinnon said a DNR supervisor ordered her release after Pointer provided evidence that she was a journalist.</p><p data-block-key=\"nkkak\">Pointer’s restraints were removed; she’d been detained for approximately 10 minutes.</p><p data-block-key=\"i5hax\">“Bottom line, I was going to jail if the journalists weren’t there,” Pointer told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"u6sg4\">Pointer gathered her things and immediately headed up the street to catch up with the protest. She had a <a href=\"https://www.ajc.com/news/photos-fourth-day-protests-downtown-atlanta/QEezIBkVD4OHAUrhCca0LM/\">job</a> to do, she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"38p0b\">Pointer told the Tracker it was frustrating to know the officers were not listening to her as a journalist or as a black woman.</p><p data-block-key=\"8m7tz\">“I’m not afraid, but there’s all this legacy of why I possibly should be,” she said. “So listen to a journalist when they tell you who they are. Don’t detain us. Let’s have a conversation.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6mif3\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd while in police custody. Find all of these cases <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Pointer_arrest_ATL_0530.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"8f0a8\">Atlanta Journal-Constitution photographer Alyssa Pointer was detained while covering protests in Atlanta on June 1, 2020. Three other journalists intervened on her behalf until she was released.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "Atlanta Police Department",
"arrest_status": "detained and released without being processed",
"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,
"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": null,
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"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Georgia",
"abbreviation": "GA"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Alyssa Pointer (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Broadcast photographer struck with pepper balls while covering Buffalo protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/broadcast-photographer-struck-with-pepper-balls-while-covering-buffalo-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-15T04:18:38.545378Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-17T15:51:26.989397Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-17T15:51:26.910516Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Buffalo",
"longitude": -78.87837,
"latitude": 42.88645,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"c0b4p\">A news crew from WIVB in Buffalo, New York, was struck by crowd-control munitions fired by police while covering protests in the city on June 1, 2020, the same night a Buffalo protester was tackled and forcibly arrested by police while giving an on-camera interview.</p><p data-block-key=\"v8bpa\">The demonstrations that evening were part of a wave of protests resulting from a viral video showing a Minneapolis police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest on May 25. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a hospital.</p><p data-block-key=\"sn835\">June 1 was <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2020/06/01/us/ap-us-america-protests-officers-struck.html?searchResultPosition=20\">a particularly chaotic night in Buffalo</a>. At one point, an SUV carrying two people who had been shot drove through a line of law enforcement officers, two of whom suffered injuries and were taken to a hospital. Blocks away from that incident, police deployed tear gas to clear the streets. In the midst of that, WIVB photographer Brad Berchou and reporter Dave Greber were caught in a volley of pepper ball fire from police. One of the projectiles hit the camera lens, but it was not damaged.</p><p data-block-key=\"1131j\">In an interview with WIVB, Greber said that he did not believe he and Berchou were targeted because they were journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"i2u1q\">“I think they were firing at anything that moved. And we happened to be moving,” he said. “I would hope, to be honest with you, that they didn’t know who we were. It would be a real shame that if they identified us as media positively, and then pulled the trigger.”</p><p data-block-key=\"u5wgr\">At a press conference, Buffalo police captain Jeff Rinaldo said that any harm journalists suffered during the protests from police was incidental.</p><p data-block-key=\"xphsr\">“We try as hard as we can to make sure that members of the media have access to these events. But when situations like this unfold, when we’re trying to disperse large crowds, there is the potential for media members to become part of the situation,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"sa42m\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": null,
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "",
"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,
"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": "no",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
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"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
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"state": {
"name": "New York",
"abbreviation": "NY"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"chemical irritant",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Brad Berchou (WIVB-TV)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": [],
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Senior Telemundo correspondent hit with projectile during protests in DC",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/senior-telemundo-correspondent-hit-with-projectile-during-protests-in-dc/",
"first_published_at": "2021-10-19T15:30:05.437330Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-17T15:54:51.505177Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-17T15:54:51.413774Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Washington",
"longitude": -77.03637,
"latitude": 38.89511,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"pd0i5\">Multiple journalists for the Spanish-language outlet Telemundo reported being hit with projectiles while covering protests near the White House on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"hguta\">The protests that day were part of a wave of demonstrations resulting from a viral video showing a Minneapolis, Minnesota, police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest on May 25. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since the end of May.</p><p data-block-key=\"jux4c\">The Telemundo journalists — senior Washington correspondent Cristina Londoño Rooney, bureau chief Lori Montenegro and cameraman Edwin López — reported being hit with projectiles as law enforcement officials attempted to disperse protesters half an hour before the district’s 7 p.m. curfew on June 1 and as President Donald Trump addressed the nation from the Rose Garden nearby.</p><p data-block-key=\"l1hm5\">Emailed requests to the Telemundo journalists for interviews were not returned as of press time.</p><p data-block-key=\"twcuh\">In a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/luisfemiami/status/1267615162355388417\">video</a> posted shortly before being hit, Londoño described “a very tense atmosphere” and how tear gas was “already starting to make our throats itch.” She wondered if “protesters are aware that the president will be addressing the nation any time.”</p><p data-block-key=\"k9jgn\">After the attack, the Colombian journalist posted a <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=731606084241442\">video</a> in which she detailed the journalists’ injuries, stating that Montenegro had been hit on the back and that her throat was sore after breathing air filled with tear gas; that López had been hit on his right arm and ribs; and that law enforcement had used “long weapons that were pointing at us” to push them out of the area close to the White House.</p><p data-block-key=\"gqvvm\">In a <a href=\"https://twitter.com/CristiLondono/status/1269111643012808704/photo/1\">tweet on June 5</a>, Londoño shared pictures of her wounds and bruises, writing, “The White House also said rubber bullets were not used. Can anyone tell me what this looks like?”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"es\" dir=\"ltr\">La Casa Blanca negó que usaron gases lacrimógenos o balas de goma para dispersar a los manifestantes y periodistas el lunes. Sentí los gases y el <a href=\"https://twitter.com/washingtonpost?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@washingtonpost</a> ahora los confirma. Y esto ¿Me pueden decir esto qué es? <a href=\"https://t.co/CkjEIPSwqu\">pic.twitter.com/CkjEIPSwqu</a></p>— Cristina Londoño Rooney (@CristiLondono) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/CristiLondono/status/1269111643012808704?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 6, 2020</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"fk323\">D.C. is notable for the<a href=\"https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/05/protests-washington-dc-federal-agents-law-enforcement-302551\"> large number of different police forces</a> that operate within its borders. Park Police said in a <a href=\"https://www.nps.gov/subjects/uspp/6_2_20_statement_from_acting_chief_monahan.htm\">statement</a> on June 2 that its officers and other assisting law enforcement partners had not used tear gas that day, though multiple outlets, including the <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/park-police-spokesman-acknowledges-chemical-agents-used-on-lafayette-square-protesters-are-similar-to-tear-gas/2020/06/05/971a8d78-a75a-11ea-b473-04905b1af82b_story.html\">Washington Post</a>, have reported that “chemical agents” were deployed. Regarding this particular incident, Park Police did not respond to our request for comment as of press time.</p><p data-block-key=\"pbw7p\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"arresting_authority": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"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": "unknown",
"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": "District of Columbia",
"abbreviation": "DC"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"Black Lives Matter",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Cristina Londoño Rooney (Telemundo)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Radio journalist tear gassed, injured at Oakland protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/radio-journalist-tear-gassed-injured-at-oakland-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2022-12-02T18:58:52.728523Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-04-03T23:39:13.833874Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-04-03T23:39:13.751448Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Oakland",
"longitude": -122.2708,
"latitude": 37.80437,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"relbp\">KCBS Radio reporter Timothy Ryan was caught in a cloud of tear gas and severely injured his ankle while covering protests in Oakland, California, on June 1, 2020, according to a lawsuit filed on his behalf in January 2022.</p><p data-block-key=\"ejg0\">Protests in Oakland took place amid a national wave of demonstrations against racism and police brutality sparked by the death of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis in May 2020. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented hundreds of incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control munitions or tear gas or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?tags=Black%20Lives%20Matter%201%20year\">Find these incidents here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"23ik6\">Ryan told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was covering the demonstration downtown as protesters marched toward the Oakland Police Department. <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.391057/gov.uscourts.cand.391057.23.0.pdf\">According to the lawsuit</a>, Ryan was reporting near the corner of Broadway and Ninth Streets at approximately 7:40 p.m., shortly before the city-wide curfew order went into effect.</p><p data-block-key=\"eefb4\">“Just like I’ve seen so many times in Oakland, there were a couple hundred police officers, all in their riot gear,” Ryan said. “And as I usually do, I positioned myself close enough to the action but always keeping an eye out for an escape route.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cdioe\">Ryan said he saw two small, plastic water bottles fly toward the police officers. Instantly, the officers began deploying tear gas and flash-bang grenades into the crowd.</p><p data-block-key=\"d97du\">“I didn’t think their reaction would be so violent,” he said. “Instantly, it just gets chaotic.”</p><p data-block-key=\"34kel\">Ryan said he was half a block away from the skirmish line and he attempted to flee as a thick cloud of tear gas enveloped him.</p><p data-block-key=\"9l4n7\">“I’m overcome with tear gas and it’s dark and I’m blinded,” he said. “I turn to run and in that retreat, in just the first couple of steps, I move from the sidewalk to the street and that movement twists my right foot in.”</p><p data-block-key=\"58s2i\">Ryan told the Tracker he tore two ligaments and broke a bone in his right foot. He said that while the adrenaline helped him push through the pain and continue reporting for several hours, his injuries ultimately required surgery and he still has a limp.</p><p data-block-key=\"6lth5\">Ryan was wearing a helmet labeled with “PRESS,” had his KCBS press identification attached to his belt and was carrying a digital recorder and microphone with the KCBS logo, according to his lawsuit.</p><p data-block-key=\"4ga4a\">“The tear gas attack by defendants on plaintiff RYAN was motivated by his status as a working journalist or was committed with reckless disregard to his status as a journalist and his peaceful and lawful presence at the protest,” the suit states.</p><p data-block-key=\"ff8mc\">Then-Deputy Police Chief Leronne Armstrong said during a town hall meeting on June 8 that the department would examine each instance when munitions were deployed during the protest, <a href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/oakland-police-will-now-investigate-tear-gas-deployment-at-protest-as-criticism-mounts\">KTVU FOX 2 reported</a>. He also acknowledged that it was possible the crowd did not hear the officer’s dispersal order.</p><p data-block-key=\"19v9m\">Armstrong, who became chief of police in 2021, <a href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/oakland-police-chief-apologizes-issues-33-disciplinary-actions-for-using-tear-gas-against-protesters\">issued an apology</a> one year after the protest for the police response and announced that he had issued at least 33 disciplinary actions to officers for violating city and department policy.</p><p data-block-key=\"f1ghl\">"We failed on June 1," Armstrong told KTVU. "We deployed tear gas outside policy. I apologize to the young people that you had to experience what you experienced. This department is holding itself accountable."</p><p data-block-key=\"a8o07\">Ryan filed his lawsuit on Jan. 26, 2022, against the city of Oakland and two Oakland Police Department officers who had supervised the police response.</p><p data-block-key=\"au4md\">Ryan’s attorney, Dan Siegel, told the Tracker that the goal of the suit is to hold the department accountable for its excessive use of force, and they are seeking both policy change and monetary damages.</p><p data-block-key=\"d31s0\">In November, Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu dismissed the municipal liability claims against the city, but ruled that the remainder of the claims — including First Amendment retaliation and supervisory liability — can stand.</p><p data-block-key=\"apb46\">According to court records reviewed by the Tracker, a jury trial in the case is scheduled for Sept. 25, 2023.</p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"7c7ix\">Oakland police disperse a crowd with tear gas on June 1, 2020. KCBS reporter Timothy Ryan, who was covering the protest against police brutality, severely injured his ankle when fleeing the chemical irritant.</p>",
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"(2023-08-16 14:23:00+00:00) Radio journalist wins settlement after tear-gassing at Oakland protest"
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{
"title": "Cincinnati Enquirer journalist detained as cameras roll",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/cincinnati-enquirer-journalist-detained-cameras-roll/",
"first_published_at": "2020-06-11T04:26:10.563431Z",
"last_published_at": "2024-06-10T20:28:52.602592Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2024-06-10T20:28:52.511708Z",
"date": "2020-06-01",
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"city": "Cincinnati",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ynogx\">Cincinnati police temporarily detained Enquirer journalist Pat Brennan as he covered protests against police violence in the Over-The-Rhine neighborhood on June 1, 2020.</p><p data-block-key=\"g3634\">Brennan told the Tracker that he normally covers professional soccer but has reported on many police scenes in his career. With a short staff due to furloughs, he was recruited to help cover the protests that swept through Cincinnati and the rest of the nation after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody on May 25.</p><p data-block-key=\"ket9p\">Cincinnati police began to enforce a<a href=\"https://twitter.com/HCEMA/status/1267537596164517889\"> curfew</a> shortly after 8 p.m., the paper<a href=\"https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2020/06/01/cincinnati-enquirer-journalist-detained-during-protest-coverage/5313869002/\"> reported</a>. A video provided by Brennan shows a SWAT vehicle advancing as a loudspeaker blares warnings to leave the streets or face arrest. Protesters run away from the police line. Brennan decided to stay put, identify as a journalist, and let the police pass, he told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"j8zhs\">His colleague Maddie Mitchell told the Enquirer that Brennan was separated from the group and she called out to him to rejoin. But he suddenly disappeared from view as he crossed behind a police vehicle.</p><p data-block-key=\"qz64k\">Brennan had crossed behind the vehicle on the orders of the police, his video shows. Brennan records police arresting two people. One officer tells Brennan to “do what you want but back up.” Brennan says he is trying to reconnect with his crew. An officer says to go on the other side of the vehicle. So Brennan crossed to the other side of the street and sought a way to reconnect with his colleagues, he told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"9i18j\">The detention was captured in two videos filmed by other media present.</p><p data-block-key=\"dizdu\">Courtney Francisco, a senior journalist with the local ABC affiliate WCPO,<a href=\"https://www.instagram.com/p/CA8kpkHpbVU/\"> posted</a> on her social media a video that begins moments before police took Brennan into custody.</p><p data-block-key=\"tldt2\">In the video, two police officers warn Francisco and the WCPO crew to leave the area. “Sir, we are with the news,” she says. “I know but we need space,” one officer responds before warning her again to get back.</p><p data-block-key=\"msbwt\">Within a minute, the camera swings towards a commotion and records at least seven officers taking Brennan to the ground. As an officer pulls out plastic restraints to cuff Brennan, Francisco gets quickly caught up herself. The two police officers who previously warned her begin shoving her backwards. The officers force the crew around the corner of a building and out of sight of Brennan.</p><p data-block-key=\"jd6n5\">“They were pushing very hard and very fast. I couldn’t keep up,” she says to the camera.</p><p data-block-key=\"c2j9s\">Nick Swartsell, a journalist on furlough from the Cincinnati CityBeat, posted a<a href=\"https://twitter.com/nswartsell/status/1267612155840528385\"> video</a> on Twitter showing Brennan walk by a police SWAT vehicle toward the police line. Police officers stop Brennan, who is wearing a mask, goggles, and a badge around his neck. A police loudspeaker blares “He’s been told” before the officers take him to the ground.</p><p data-block-key=\"0bbxx\">Brennan told the Tracker he did his best to avoid face-planting as one officer stuck his leg out to trip him. He collapsed to the ground with the officers, who shoved his cheek into the pavement and cuffed him. Police then brought him to a wall where others were being held.</p><p data-block-key=\"kp7yf\">The police released Brennan from custody without charge after 30 minutes, according to the Enquirer.</p><p data-block-key=\"02wcx\">That night Brennan said on<a href=\"https://twitter.com/PBrennanENQ/status/1267656078067720198\"> Twitter</a> that he had a “respectful conversation” with Cincinnati’s chief of police, Eliot Isaac. Brennan told the Tracker that Isaac arrived on scene and immediately went to apologize to Brennan.</p><p data-block-key=\"162kb\">The police department <a href=\"https://twitter.com/CincyPD/status/1267629539980648451\">apologized</a> on Twitter for “any inconvenience” regarding Brennan’s detention and Francisco’s removal from the area. According to<a href=\"https://twitter.com/nswartsell/status/1267622449115467778\"> Swartsell</a>, Isaac said Brennan “got mixed up in the crowd,” claiming he was wearing goggles and a mask without an obvious ID.</p><p data-block-key=\"iqikl\">Lt. Steve Saunders, a spokesman for the Cincinnati police department, told the Tracker on June 10 that the department had entered ongoing conversations with media outlets to help better identify journalists and ensure they can report while not interfering in police operations. “If we can do things better, we want to do things better,” he said, while insisting that this applies to journalists, too.</p><p data-block-key=\"mw34s\">Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley also <a href=\"https://twitter.com/JohnCranley/status/1267628761027141634\">apologized</a> on Twitter, calling the arrest a “big mistake” and stating that reporters are crucial to democracy.</p><p data-block-key=\"n9y6c\">Francisco and Swartsell did not respond to emailed requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"vgcks\">The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred total incidents of journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country related to the death of George Floyd while in police custody. Find all of these cases <a href=\"/blog/blm-and-unprecedented-aggressions-against-media/\">here</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"mohox\">While documenting protests in Cincinnati, journalists with ABC affiliate WCPO captured multiple officers forcing Cincinnati Enquirer journalist Pat Brennan to the ground to detain him.</p>",
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