I can hardly bear to write this. And it won't be comprehensive because I'm shaking with anger. But someone has to put the item up there.
Offices of the tiny Marion County (Kansas) Record and the homes of its employees had all their reporting materials and electronic equipment seized in a series of raids conducted Friday by the five members of the local police department plus two sherriffs, the newspaper and other outlets reported.
Here's the Record, the Kansas Reflector, The Guardian, and Raw Story (reporting on the
death of the publisher's 98-year-old mother after police descended on their home, rifled through files and impounded her personal computer as well as an Alexa speaker).
Other outlets have since picked up the news.
Raiding a newsroom in the U. S. Is quite unusual and in general, requires a subpoena to be issued rather than just a search warrant.
The warrant was issued by a local judge. The grounds for the warrant have not been released. The newspaper announced it plans to file a federal lawsuit.
What led to this?
A liquor license application, a drunk driving conviction, a divorce proceeding, an existing hostility to media, or some combination?
Briefly, as best I understand from news reports, a local restaurant owner was applying for a liquor license when a confidential source shared evidence with the newspaper that the person had previously been in legal trouble for drunk driving and had continued to drive on a suspended license, facts that could impact the application. The paper checked into it and was able to verify, apparently from public information or the applicant, that the tip was true.
However, the editor decided not to publish the story because the source might be transmitting information from the license applicant's spouse, in the midst of a divorce. (This is a type of judgement editors have to make all the time. The majority of confidential tips cannot be used in a story for any of several possible reasons, but some are, and protecting confidentiality remains a journalistic responsibility.)
Instead, the editor privately notified police about the anonymous tip.
Kansas Reflector :
Police notified [the license applicant], who then complained at a city council meeting that the newspaper had illegally obtained and disseminated sensitive documents, which isn’t true. Her public comments prompted the newspaper to set the record straight in a story published Thursday,
The police then raided the newspaper and apparently, everyone connected with it.
The license applicant had previously clashed with the newspaper, ejecting the publisher from a public meeting that was being held at the restaurant, according to what the publisher told CNN.
I won't go on about everything that is wrong with this picture.
It seems reminiscent of a 2021 incident where a reporter with the the St. Louis Post-Dispatch discovered social security numbers were potentially exposed on a state agency website. The newspaper did not publish its discovery of that flaw, but notified the state so the problem could be corrected. In return, the Missouri governor pledged, repeatedly to prosecute that newspaper and its reporter for "hacking." The county prosecutor, on whose shoulders that responsibility would rest, eventually decided not to prosecute, however.
Developing story. Updates and refinements welcome.