Jury says journalist arrested while videotaping police is not guilty

[Damaso]

"A jury acquitted a Florida photojournalist who was arrested on January 31 while documenting the eviction of Occupy Miami protesters. The police accused Carlos Miller, author of a popular blog about the rights of photojournalists, of disobeying a lawful police order to clear the area. But another journalist testified he had been standing nearby without incident.


"After Miller's January arrest, the police confiscated his camera and deleted some of his footage, including video documenting his encounter with the police. That may prove to be an expensive mistake. Miller was able to recover the footage, which proved helpful in winning his acquittal. He says his next step will be to file a lawsuit charging that the deletion of the footage violated his constitutional rights."
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...ested-while-videotaping-police-is-not-guilty/

 

[swoop]

This stuff happens way too often. I know a photographer who got a $15k settlement from the NYPD after they deleted images from his camera. The odd thing is it actually happens more than you know, and the NYPD has settled a lot of them out of court. You'd think they'd just let the cops know to leave the press alone and let them do their jobs.

 

[hlockwood]

This stuff happens way too often. I know a photographer who got a $15k settlement from the NYPD after they deleted images from his camera. The odd thing is it actually happens more than you know, and the NYPD has settled a lot of them out of court. You'd think they'd just let the cops know to leave the press alone and let them do their jobs.

I would hope it applies to non-PJs as well.

Harry

 

[oftheherd]

Could this be considered evidence tampering, destruction of evidence, a criminal offense?

I would think it would be if it could be proved that the police deleted it.

I don't know if you could get a district attorney to prosecute, which may be the reason for the civil suit.

 

[Gumby]

... as I said: good for him. A well deserved conclusion.

 

[Al Patterson]

It is nice to see the right side winning these suits for a change.

We need many more though...