In
the Land of the Free, Cops Raid a Journalist’s Home, Kidnap Him After He
Refused to Name Source
In the land of the free,
journalists are now being raided by SWAT teams in an effort to find out their
sources; and this is in spite of the law protecting journalists from this very
act. Freelance journalist Bryan Carmody just fell victim to the police state in
California as multiple San Francisco cops with sledgehammers and weapons began
breaking down his door last week in an effort to find out his source for a
leaked police report.
As the Society for Professional
Journalists points out, California’s
Shield Law protects journalists from being held in contempt for refusing to
disclose their sources’ identities and other unpublished/unaired information
obtained during the news gathering process (California Constitution,
Article I, § 2(b); California Evidence Code § 1070(a)). California
Penal Code section 1524(g) provides that “no warrant shall issue” for any item protected
by the Shield Law.
Despite this protection under
the law, police still raided Carmody’s home.
The raids on Carmody’s home and office are the
latest in a series of events concerning the death of San Francisco public
defender Jeff Adachi in February, at age 59.
Within hours of Adachi’s collapsing in a San
Franscisco apartment, details from a leaked police investigation into his death
were already showing up in news reports, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
A number of the details in the police report
were salacious, suggesting that perhaps one or more members of the police
department were trying to tarnish the reputation of Adachi, who was known as a police watchdog and
fierce advocate for criminal justice reform. In San Francisco, a public
defender is an elected position.
After Carmody sold the report
to several outlets, it showed up everywhere and this likely infuriated the
police department.
Due to the nature of the report
painting police in a negative light and hurting their image, the raid could’ve
been retaliatory in nature. Indeed, since it was in direct violation of
California law, it appears as such.
According to Carmody, before
the raid, two cops came to his home to demand he tell them the source of his
report. However, knowing full well that he did not have to, Carmody politely
refused. Two weeks later, a team of cops showed up.
Carmody recalls the officers
showing up to his home, who began smashing in his door with a sledgehammer and
a battering ram, without knocking. To avoid having the front of his home
demolished by the raid, Carmody opened the door.
“I don’t think it was right to
break my door down,” he said in an interview. “I’m one of the original
independent media companies in San Francisco. This is outrageous.”
When the police came into his
home, they kidnapped Carmody for over six hours, holding him in handcuffs.
“I’m smart enough not to talk
to federal agents, ever,” Carmody told The Washington Post. “I just kept
saying ‘lawyer, lawyer, lawyer.’”
While they held Carmody
captive, the officers tore his home apart, confiscating all of his computers
and equipment.
“It’s designed to intimidate,”
Carmody’s lawyer, Thomas Burke, told The Associated Press. “It’s essentially the
confiscation of a newsroom.”
Naturally, the police are
standing by the Stasi-style raid of a journalist’s home, and referred to
Carmody’s detainment and theft of his equipment as part of an “investigation.”
David Stevenson, a spokesman
for the San Francisco police, told the Chronicle that the
“search warrant executed today was granted by a judge and conducted as part of
a criminal investigation into the leak of the Adachi police report.” He called
it “one step in the process of investigating a potential case of obstruction of
justice along with the illegal distribution of a confidential police report.”
As NPR notes, Burke said that
normally journalists would receive a subpoena, and then get a lawyer to ensure
the proper protections. “So much information has nothing to do with the purpose
of their investigation,” he said. “If you are looking for one piece of
information, that’s why you issue a subpoena.”
But this did not happen and
instead, police carried out an extremely disturbing raid on a journalist.
Luckily, because Carmody had
committed no crime, he was eventually released, but not before the cops took
the report, stole his property, and damaged his home. This is what journalism looks like in 2019.
Matt Agorist is an honorably
discharged veteran of the USMC and former intelligence operator directly tasked
by the NSA. This prior experience gives him unique insight into the world of
government corruption and the American police state. Agorist has been an
independent journalist for over a decade and has been featured on mainstream
networks around the world. Agorist is also the Editor at Large at the Free Thought Project, where this article first appeared. Follow @MattAgorist on Twitter,Steemit, and now on Minds.
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