first_published_at,last_published_at,title,slug,latest_revision_created_at,charges,legal_orders,updates,categories,links,equipment_seized,equipment_broken,targeted_journalists,authors,date,exact_date_unknown,city,state,latitude,longitude,body,introduction,teaser,teaser_image,primary_video,image_caption,arrest_status,arresting_authority,release_date,detention_date,unnecessary_use_of_force,case_number,case_statuses,case_type,status_of_seized_equipment,is_search_warrant_obtained,actor,border_point,target_us_citizenship_status,denial_of_entry,stopped_previously,did_authorities_ask_for_device_access,did_authorities_ask_about_work,assailant,was_journalist_targeted,charged_under_espionage_act,subpoena_type,subpoena_statuses,name_of_business,third_party_business,legal_order_target,legal_order_type,legal_order_venue,status_of_prior_restraint,mistakenly_released_materials,type_of_denial,targeted_institutions,tags,target_nationality,workers_whose_communications_were_obtained,politicians_or_public_figures_involved 2020-06-24 19:20:49.589346+00:00,2024-03-22 15:52:14.730037+00:00,AP photojournalist assaulted by bystander during event in Philadelphia,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/ap-photojournalist-assaulted-bystander-during-event-philadelphia/,2024-03-22 15:52:14.493720+00:00,,,(2024-03-21 11:49:00+00:00) Man who punched AP photographer sentenced to prison,Assault,,,,Matt Rourke (The Associated Press),,2020-06-04,False,Philadelphia,Pennsylvania (PA),39.95238,-75.16362,"
Associated Press photojournalist Matt Rourke was assaulted while covering an event in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on June 4, 2020.
Rourke was part of a news crew photographing and interviewing Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw and Mayor Jim Kenney in North Philadelphia as the two toured the area following days of protests spurred by the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The AP reported that as Outlaw and Kenney crossed the street, a bystander approached Rourke and punched him in the face, causing him to lose consciousness and fall to the ground. The outlet wrote that it is unclear what prompted the attack.
Officers tackled the man — later identified as Derrick King — and took him into custody. King has been charged with aggravated assault, simple assault, endangering another person and resisting arrest, the Tribune reported.
The Philadelphia Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.
Rourke, who could not be reached for comment, was treated at a hospital for significant facial injuries and has since been released.
King is facing charges of aggravated assault, simple assault, endangering another person and resisting arrest, the AP reported.
National Guard and Police maintain barricades near City Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on June 1, following days of protests. Three days later, a bystander attacked an AP photojournalist as the mayor and police commissioner toured the area.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,,,, 2020-06-28 22:56:56.594400+00:00,2020-06-30 01:55:32.387666+00:00,Freelance journalist pushed to ground by NYC officers during protests,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-photojournalist-pushed-ground-nyc-officers-during-protests/,2020-06-30 01:55:32.307025+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Nick Pinto (Freelance),,2020-06-04,False,New York,New York (NY),None,None,"Freelance journalist Nick Pinto was pushed to the ground by New York City police officers while covering protests in New York on the night of June 4, 2020, despite having visible NYPD-issued press credentials.
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.
Pinto told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he and other journalists were following a few hundred people as they marched through the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn late in the evening. Dozens of police officers trailing the group informed the protesters that they were violating the city’s 8 p.m. curfew. As protesters reached the corner of Washington Avenue and Fulton Street, Pinto said, “the police made a move to clear the intersection. It was sudden and forceful, a lot of laying on batons, a lot of people knocked to the ground.” The scene was captured on video by journalist Noah Hurowitz:
Why’re clearing the street https://t.co/DgGwF9mk8C
— Noah Hurowitz (@NoahHurowitz) June 5, 2020
This maneuver trapped protesters between two lines of police officers. In the commotion, an officer pushed Pinto, who fell into a pile of garbage bags. Pinto said he was helped to his feet by an officer, but then pushed from behind by another. The altercation was captured on video by journalist John Knefel, who can be heard repeatedly telling officers that Pinto is a journalist:
Tonight the NYPD hit a protester walking his bike and journalist @macfathom (also with a bike) with batons, knocking him over twice, completely unprovoked. The hoarse voice screaming “he’s press” is me pic.twitter.com/TVAjawRIO3
— johnknefel (@johnknefel) June 5, 2020
The group of protesters and press were contained by police until Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and City Council Member Brad Lander, who were in the crowd, negotiated with officers to allow people to leave the area 20 at a time.
Though Pinto’s credentials were visible, he didn’t feel as though he was singled out because he was a member of the media. “In this particular instance, I think it was just generalized violence,” he said.
NYPD did not respond to a request for comment.
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 these incidents here.
Protesters march through the New York borough of Brooklyn on June 4, 2020.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2020-07-30 15:51:44.659698+00:00,2021-05-25 17:48:06.696063+00:00,"BuzzFeed News reporter says was grabbed, shoved by law enforcement while covering protests in NYC",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/buzzfeed-news-reporter-says-was-grabbed-shoved-law-enforcement-while-covering-protests-nyc/,2021-05-25 17:48:06.637831+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Rosalind Adams (BuzzFeed News),,2020-06-04,False,New York,New York (NY),None,None,"Rosalind Adams, an investigative reporter for BuzzFeed News, said she was grabbed and shoved by law enforcement officers while covering protests in Manhattan on June 4, 2020.
Protests in New York and across the United States were in response to police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following a viral video that showed 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.
Adams had spent much of the afternoon of June 4 posting on her Twitter feed as she covered a memorial for Floyd in Cadman Plaza in the Brooklyn borough of the city. She followed attendees as they marched across the Brooklyn Bridge into the Manhattan borough of the city. Later that evening, about half an hour before the city’s 8 p.m. curfew, according to her feed, she’d joined up with a group of protesters walking west on 48th Street.
About an hour past curfew, Adams reported, the group was a couple hundred strong and had been very peaceful for much of the evening.
But at about 10:15 p.m., as the group reached the intersection of 5th Avenue and East 59th Street, Adams told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in an interview that she saw police moving in from the east and west, kettling the crowd. Kettling is a tactical maneuver used by law enforcement to hem in protesters.
“It happened so quickly, I didn’t even see where the cops came from,” she said.
Adams tweeted that officers “rushed the intersection” and began to make arrests.
Adams said she took out her phone to film an arrest, telling the Tracker that that’s when an officer grabbed her arm, shoving her back. “I’m press, I’m press!” Adams said she yelled as she continued to film.
I was filming this arrest w my phone and cops grabbed me on my arm and pushed me back w batons. You can see officer’s baton in the video coming at me over and over again “you don’t need to push me I’m press” I’m yelling #nycprotest pic.twitter.com/2jZscvnqPt
— Rosalind Adams (@RosalindZAdams) June 5, 2020
Adams said officers kept pushing her. One used his baton to block her arm and pushed her chest, she said. “He must have hit my arms, and pushed me around the shoulders,” she said.
She walked backward, keeping an eye out. She said that’s when another officer grabbed her phone and pushed her. Then, several more police grabbed her.
Adams said the police tried to push all the journalists to the sidewalk, with one telling her, “You’re in the arrest area!”
She said another officer yelled, “If you don’t have a press card, we will collar you!” Adams had her BuzzFeed ID, but no New York Police Department-issued credentials.
According to NY1, more than 200 people across the city were taken into custody that evening.
The New York Police Department did not return phone or email requests for comment.
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 these incidents here.
Demonstrators march in the Manhattan borough of New York City on June 4, 2020.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2020-08-31 11:49:05.313644+00:00,2023-09-01 18:30:32.963903+00:00,Journalist arrested following Birmingham protest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-arrested-following-birmingham-protest/,2023-09-01 18:30:32.752480+00:00,unknown (charges dropped as of 2023-07-27),,(2023-07-27 11:02:00+00:00) Charges dropped against journalist arrested in Birmingham,Arrest/Criminal Charge,,,,Michael Harriot (The Root),,2020-06-04,False,Birmingham,Alabama (AL),33.52066,-86.80249,"Michael Harriot, a senior writer for the Root, was arrested while covering protests in Birmingham, Alabama, on June 4, 2020, according to published reports of the event.
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 an arrest on May 25. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. The incident sparked anti-police brutality and Black Lives Matter demonstrations across the country.
According to AL.com, approximately 100 people had assembled in Linn Park on the afternoon of June 4. At around 7 p.m., curfew in Birmingham at the time, police reportedly directed the crowd to disperse and told members of the media to have their press credentials clearly displayed. Many protesters had left the park by that point, according to AL.com, but the few who were willing to get arrested stayed, and they were.
According to the news site, officers then made their way to an area where members of the media had gathered, including Harriot, who was filming with his cellphone. Harriot did not respond to emailed requests for comment.
In a video shot by AL.com of Harriot's arrest, reporter Carol Robinson can be heard narrating the scene, saying, “They’re asking if he’s media. He says he is. But he says he does not have a credential.”
In an article for the Root, Harriot noted that multiple journalists had not been wearing credentials, citing a security advisory that warned that press badges had made some journalists targets.
“The cops asked if there was anyone they could call to verify that I was press,” Harriot wrote. “I pointed to the police officers and called them by their names but my arresting officers did not bother to verify the information.”
Harriot also said that he advised the officers to call the mayor’s office, as he had conducted an interview with Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin less than 24 hours earlier. The officers also would not allow Harriot access to his phone so he could show them his digital credential.
According to AL.com, the officers then zip-tied his hands and directed him into a police van.
Later that day, Harriot tweeted succinctly about his arrest and that he was still being held in the Birmingham City Jail. In a tweet posted a little over an hour later, he said that he had been released.
Arrested. Was covering protests. Still in Birmingham City Jail.@TheRoot @JoyAnnReid @rolandsmartin
— michaelharriot (@michaelharriot) June 5, 2020
In his account of the arrest and his time in custody, Harriot wrote that in the three years he has covered protests, activism and police brutality in Birmingham — in addition to other Black Lives Matters protests across the country — he had never before been arrested.
“Even after local reporters were attacked while covering the recent protests, I was not worried,” he wrote. He also noted that by the time he was arrested, the protest had entirely dispersed.
But despite standing entirely apart from the park and surrounded by other members of the press, Harriot was arrested.
“I informed them that I was with the media and I knew they were about to be in some deep shit when they rounded up those of us who didn’t have visible credentials,” he wrote. “Locking me up was one thing, but arresting journalists for doing their job was another thing.”
“They did not arrest ‘journalists.’ They arrested the only black journalist.”
While at a staging area a few blocks away, Harriot said, an officer leveraged his knee against Harriot’s thigh in order to secure the zip cuffs as tight as possible. Harriot wrote that despite his efforts to keep blood flowing, he eventually lost all feeling in his hands.
After arriving at the city jail, Harriot said, multiple officers attempted and failed to remove the cuffs, as his hands had swollen. Ultimately, he recounted, officers had to dig into Harriot’s skin in order to cut the zip ties.
Harriot said officers then directed him to put on a jail uniform, took his mug shot and fingerprinted him. He said he was then informed that someone was waiting to speak with him.
“‘Finally,’ I thought. ‘It’s probably the mayor or one of his highest level administration officials who is here to make sure I’m ok,’” Harriot wrote. “Nah. It was the FBI.”
The agents, Harriot said, read him his Miranda rights and said they “just wanted to talk.” Harriot says he declined.
Shortly thereafter, he was able to retrieve his cellphone and was released to a lobby where activists waited to bail out and welcome those who had been arrested.
On June 5, Mayor Woodfin commented on the Birmingham Police Department’s treatment of journalists. Two other reporters — Howard Koplowitz and Jonece Starr Dunigan — had been detained on June 3.
“Our curfew was not intended to stifle the voices of our people or our press,” Woodfin wrote on Twitter. “We need them more now than ever.”
BPD Public Information Officer Sergeant Rod Mauldin advised the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker to direct all questions about Harriot’s arrest to the mayor’s office, which did not respond to emails requesting comment.
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 these incidents here.
Independent journalist Ashoka Jegroo was pushed and hit with a baton by a police officer while covering a racial justice protest in the Bronx borough of New York on June 4, 2020.
The protest, in the Mott Haven neighborhood in the Bronx, was one of many demonstrations organized across the city in response to the police killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others in 2020. Jegroo regularly reports and films video footage of protests, which he sells to media outlets.
In a phone interview, Jegroo told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was at the front of the demonstration, near some of the organizers, as they began marching through the neighborhood on the evening of June 4. A few minutes before a citywide 8 p.m. curfew went into effect, said Jegroo, city police officers moved to break up the protest using a crowd control tactic called kettling, in which police block demonstrators from leaving. As police advanced on the crowd, Jegroo and organizers at the front of the march were separated from the “kettle” and pushed across the street by police, the journalist said.
Jegroo said that police appeared to target an organizer near him who was using a megaphone to communicate to the larger group.
In a video Jegroo posted on Twitter, a line of NYPD officers is seen standing on the street. An NYPD officer in a yellow helmet approaches another officer and points into the crowd. “You want her locked up?” the second officer asks. “OK.”
The second officer then moves swiftly, striking at protesters and swiping toward Jegroo. “Get the fuck back, I’m not fucking with you, get the fuck back,” the officer says.
NYPD cops are making violent arrests & beating people with batons at the #FTP4 march in the Bronx. I just got hit with a baton & pusher by cops. pic.twitter.com/w6YOxXssvj
— Ash J (@AshAgony) June 5, 2020
Jegroo said that the police officer struck him with a baton on his abdomen between his belly button and his groin. Jegroo said he then ran away from the line of police, following two protest organizers as they sought to see what was happening to the larger group of demonstrators cordoned off by police. When they encountered more police, officers grabbed the organizers, Jegroo said, then threw him against a fence, where he slid down to the ground.
Jegroo said that as he attempted to get up, a police officer pulled him up, turned him around and pinned him against a gate, holding one of the journalist’s arms behind his back. A second officer questioned Jegroo, asking why he was there and where he lived, while another officer rifled through his backpack, Jegroo said. After searching through his bag, the police freed Jegroo. He said he collected his belongings, which the police had dropped on the ground. He reported that none of his reporting equipment was damaged.
Jegroo said he did not identify himself to police as a journalist at any point during the protest. He said that in past encounters with police, he had found that identifying himself as a reporter did not help. “I've tried to do that before, but … they don't give a damn,” he said.
NYPD did not respond to a request for comment about Jegroo’s experience.
The march was the fourth organized by a coalition of grassroots groups under the name FTP4, initials that various group members say can stand for “For the People,” “Feed the People,” or “Fuck the Police.” Police tactics during the Mott Haven march came under criticism in a report released in September by Human Rights Watch. The group said that police conduct during the FTP4 march was “intentional, planned, and unjustified,” and that NYPD’s response violated international human rights law.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering these protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Journalist Ashoka Jegroo was documenting a protest in the New York borough of the Bronx when he was shoved and hit with an NYPD officer's baton.
",detained and released without being processed,New York Police Department,2020-06-04,2020-06-04,False,None,[],None,returned in full,False,law enforcement,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,unknown,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2020-12-02 18:21:00.501744+00:00,2023-07-17 14:36:35.909487+00:00,Russian freelance journalist arrested while covering protests in Brooklyn,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/russian-freelance-journalist-arrested-while-covering-protests-brooklyn/,2023-07-17 14:36:35.741275+00:00,curfew violation: violation of mayor’s emergency order (unknown as of 2020-12-08),,(2020-12-08 14:31:00+00:00) Charges against Russian freelance journalist filed under incorrect name,Arrest/Criminal Charge,,,,Yana Mulder (REN.TV),,2020-06-04,False,New York,New York (NY),None,None,"Russian freelance journalist Yana Mulder was reporting on protests in the New York borough of Brooklyn on June 4, 2020, when she was arrested while trying to intervene in the violent arrest of her husband. Mulder said she told police that she was press and that her husband was assisting the TV production crew.
The protest came one day after New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio imposed an 8 p.m. curfew aimed at controlling escalating unrest in the city. Essential workers — who, in New York, include members of the media — were exempt.
In a phone interview with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, Mulder said that she was reporting that night on a post-curfew protest in Brooklyn for the Russian television channel REN.TV. She said she followed the protest through the streets of Brooklyn until it abruptly stopped at the intersection of Wythe Avenue and Penn Street.
Mulder said the protesters halted when they were just 10 or 15 steps away from a line of New York Police Department officers. She said she, along with her cameraman, her photographer, and her husband, stood off to the right side of the protest with another group of journalists. Mulder said her husband was helping the broadcast crew by holding up a light for the camera.
According to Mulder, police officers took out packs of zip-ties, which she reported on camera, noting that they were going to start arresting people. At this point, some at the rear of the group began to disperse, leaving about three layers of protesters facing the police, Mulder told the Tracker.
Daniel Verde, a journalist who was also at the intersection when the police charged forward to arrest protesters, posted a video on Twitter at 9:21 p.m. showing police pursuing and grabbing protesters as they tried to flee.
In a video taken of the advance on her phone, Mulder can be heard warning her camera operator to be careful while moving toward an armored police car.
One policeman shouts, “Let’s go!” and Mulder directs her crew to capture the officers charging the protesters. As Mulder spins to look around her, she sees her husband, Nick Mulder, on the ground being hit with a baton by an officer while in the process of being arrested. Mulder can be heard yelling to the officer, “Please, please don’t!” The officer responds, “Stay out of here, go back!” At this point, Mulder turns her phone camera off.
According to Mulder, her husband had come to pick her up from the protest and was helping the production crew by holding a light for the broadcast.
“I tried to explain to the police that I’m a reporter; I told him that my husband was part of the group,” she said. Despite identifying herself as press, “four other cops grabbed me, put handcuffs on me as well, and we were both escorted to the [bus].”
Mulder’s phone video showed that, as she asked police to stop, the crowd surrounding the journalist and her husband yelled repeatedly that they were press. One person tweeted about the arrests:
I was arrested here — along with a young female journalist. She was speaking on camera when they grabbed her. They knocked down, beat, and arrested her husband, who was part of the production crew, holding a light. Their sound and camera guys got away.
— Sarah Rose Kearns (@Persuasion_JA) June 5, 2020
Mulder said that police zip-tied her husband’s hands and hers, and they were brought to the 90th precinct in a bus full of protesters.
At the station, Mulder said, she offered to show her press pass from the IWW Freelance Journalists Union, as well as an email from her employer about her assignment. “They didn’t look at anything,” she told the Tracker.
In an Instagram post Mulder wrote that her bag was taken and the police officer in charge of searching bags asked her “Do you have anything in your bag that can hurt me?” When she replied in the negative, the officer returned her bag without searching it, she said. After five hours, the couple was released with a summons for a court date a month later, according to Mulder.
According to the summons slip, which the Tracker reviewed, Mulder was charged with “violation of Mayor’s emergency order,” a Class B misdemeanor that carries a fine of up to $500 and a maximum of three months in prison in the New York Penal Code. Neither Mulder nor her husband appeared in court on the day listed on her summons, since the Kings & New York Criminal Court had been closed indefinitely since March. Mulder told the Tracker that no one from NYPD followed up on the summonses issued to her and her husband, perhaps because their last name was spelled incorrectly as M-O-U-L-D-E-R.
Mulder said that the American Civil Liberties Union contacted her husband Nick shortly after the incident. According to the journalist, the ACLU is working with her husband to file a civil suit against the NYPD.
The NYPD did not respond to a request for comment.
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 these incidents here.
Editor's Note: This article was updated to reflect the correct spelling of Nick Mulder’s name.
Lesley McLam, host of a KBOO podcast, was violently grabbed and shoved by police while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on June 4, 2020, according to her ongoing lawsuit against the city and Mayor Ted Wheeler, and other law enforcement officers.
McLam, who did not respond to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker’s request for comment, was covering the protests that broke out in Portland and across the country in response to the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white police officer in Minneapolis.
McLam filed a civil lawsuit, along with her colleague Cory Elia, against the city and multiple law enforcement officers on July 8. The lawsuit cites multiple press freedom violations against both journalists.
According to the complaint, McLam was covering the protesters that had gathered in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center when she saw a group of individuals near a dumpster fire about a half block away. At the time, McLam was wearing a black baseball cap with white lettering that identified her as “PRESS.” Her backpack was also labeled “MEDIA” and she had prominently displayed press credentials.
McLam started filming the fire with her cellphone and narrating the events when police officers in riot gear arrived and announced the street was closed. According to the complaint, McLam continued filming but moved to the sidewalk, allowing space for people and officers to pass.
The complaint said McLam was filming when an officer approached her. She identified herself as a member of the press while displaying her credentials when the officer violently grabbed McLam by the throat. She was then shoved backward by that officer and two others.
On June 28, the Americans Civil Liberties Union of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit against the city of Portland and its law enforcement. The city later agreed to a preliminary injunction to not arrest, harm, or impede working journalists or legal observers at protests.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protest, citing ongoing litigation.