Publisher’s Perspective

By Tim Douglass, Publisher of the Pope County Tribune

Raid and seizure was likely to stop a Kansas weekly from printing it’s next issue:  It didn’t

We were shocked and disheartened by the recent police raid of a community weekly newspaper–The Marion County Record in Kansas.

And, we stand in solidarity with that newspaper’s publisher and staff.  We denounce the raid as an egregious assault on the freedom of the press.  Like most journalists all over this country, we take freedom of the press very seriously.

For those who aren’t up to date on what happened, here’s a brief description of the events that took place in that small town newspaper with a circulation and population much like ours here at the Pope County Tribune.

According to multiple news reports, including from the Marion Record itself, The Marion County Record newspaper office was raided by police officers who seized personal cell phones, computers, a file server and other equipment from reporters.  The police also went to Eric Meyer’s home, the man who owns, edits and publishes the Marion County Record, and confiscated computers and his 98-year-old mother’s “Alexa” server and even photographed Meyer’s bank statements.  According to the Record’s own reporting, Meyer’s mother died a few days later.  She was stressed from the raid and seizure and she had stopped eating and couldn’t sleep, Meyer told news reporters.

There is much more to this situation in Kansas, and recent reports are proving the experts were correct in condemning the raid.  Those experts first were criticizing the police department for requesting a search warrant and those issuing the warrant, arguing the move violated the U.S. Constitution as well as other laws that grant journalists protection from searches and seizures.  The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press issued a statement a few days after the raid that was co-signed by more than 30 news organizations and allied groups, including the Associated Press, Bloomberg, Gannett, Kansas Press Association, New York Times, NBC, The New Yorker, Reuters and the Washington Post.

Addressed to Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody, the letter included these paragraphs:

“Newsroom searches and seizures are among the most intrusive actions law enforcement can take with respect to the free press, and the most potentially suppressive of free speech by the press and the public.

“Based on public reporting, the search warrant that has been published online, and your public statements to the press, there appears to be no justification for the breadth and intrusiveness of the search — particularly when other investigative steps may have been available — and we are concerned that it may have violated federal law strictly limiting federal, state, and local law enforcement’s ability to conduct newsroom searches. We urge you to immediately return the seized material to the Record, to purge any records that may already have been accessed, and to initiate a full independent and transparent review of your department’s actions.”

In a recent opinion written in a neighboring Kansas newspaper, the writer stated that Kansas Bureau of Investigation Director Tony Mattivi “showed himself woefully inadequate to the moment days after the raid.”

“In a statement, the director claimed to “very strongly” believe in free speech. On the other hand, he continued, “We have investigated those who work at schools, churches and at all levels of public service. No one is above the law, whether a public official or a representative of the media.”

That’s called gaslighting, folks.

“The question isn’t whether reporters are above the law. It’s whether Marion law enforcement is above the law. It’s about whether Mattivi and his organization are above providing the protections granted every single American by the U.S. Constitution.”

In the latest news about the situation, it has been reported that the local prosecutor has agreed to withdraw a search warrant executed on the newspaper Friday and will return all seized items, answering demands of press freedom advocates who sharply condemned the police action.

There is much more to why the police would seek and the county attorney and judge would grant a search and seizure at the newspaper office, and much had to do with a disgruntled restaurant owner and the newspaper’s possible investigation into the background of the police chief, Gideon Cody, who came to Marion from Kansas City.

We believe that the raid on the Record was an intolerable act of suppression.  It goes against the freedoms the U.S. Constitution protects and it should disgust every American citizen.

Still, despite long hours spent reconstructing computer files on older computers at the Marion County Record, the newspaper was able to publish on time the following week.  It’s front-page headline stated: “SEIZED…but not silenced.”  The weekly  newspaper did what it was supposed to do.  It reported on the raid, complete with photos–a big story in a small town.

Oh, and the paper received overwhelming support from the community and throughout the country, selling some 1,500 new digital subscriptions in just a few days.