Sunshine Week runs all this week: Event celebrates open government and offers plenty of free promotional materials.

Sunshine Week, an annual event highlighting the importance of open government and freedom of the press, starts on Sunday.

Now in its 19th year, this year's events run from March 16-22. National Freedom of Information Day is March 16, the birthday of James Madison, the fourth president of the United States and father of the First Amendment.



The Sunshine Week site offers free, promotional materials, including Zoom backdrops in English and Spanish, sample social media posts, op-eds, editorial cartoons, Sunshine Week logos, and a step-by-step Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) graphic. The website also features freedom of information resources with print and video explanations and the legislative history of FOIA.

Sunshine Week is coordinated by the Joseph L. Brechner Freedom of Information Project at the University of Florida’s College of Journalism and Communications. It is supported by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and a growing list of public and private endorsers.

Explore Sunshine Week here

Small paper in Oregon wins its public records battle and receives Poynter Institute's First Amendment award

Les Zaitz

In 2017, Malheur County, Oregon, was promised a rail center that would change the economic future for the area. As the project got underway, Les Zaitz, publisher of the community's newspaper, the Malheur Enterprise followed its progress. When the buildout started to falter, Zaitz doggedly reported on it, reports Nicole Slaughter Graham of The Poynter Institute. "As the Enterprise continued to publish updates about the project, backlash from the county ensued, and records requests either went unanswered or took several weeks or even months to come through." To keep his community informed, the paper and Zaitz sued the county for access to the records, and won.

The project "could have been life-changing for the residents of Malheur County, 14.9% of which live in poverty — more than any other county in Oregon," Graham explains. Years later, the Treasure Valley Reload Center project remains unfinished, but many residents of Malheur County know some of the reasons why -- because their local paper reported on it. "Zaitz committed to publishing updates on the project. It was bleeding money with no real results. . . . Zaitz knew the community stakes were high."

Location of Malheur County in
Oregon (Wikipedia map)

The county tried to paint the Enterprise as being against the project. Zaitz responded by "publishing pieces that drew back the curtains on the journalistic process, letting readers know how the reporting was going, what documents had been acquired," Graham adds. Zaitz told her, “I’d explain to people why this fight is occurring, and that this is not the Malheur Enterprise’s information. [Public records] are your information, and this is how you judge what your public officials are doing.”

Many Enterprise readers were grateful for the integrity and information provided by their newspaper. Zaitz told Graham, "I found that people really appreciated someone to sort of stop and explain in plain terms." Graham reports, "In September 2022, the Malheur Enterprise and Zaitz sued (Greg) Smith," who was overseeing the project, "citing that the paper was repeatedly denied access to public records and that [the project's manager] had knowingly tampered with, and even destroyed documents."

Throughout the lawsuit process, the Enterprise continued to report on the Reload Center's progress. "In spring 2023, the county settled the lawsuit and agreed to pay the Enterprise $40,000. The payout was arguably the least substantial aspect of the settlement," Graham writes. "Additionally, the county’s lawyer, in a rare legal move, admitted to the county’s wrongdoing."

There's more to this happy ending for Zaitz's Malheur Enterprise -- it earned The First Amendment Award for 2024 from the Poynter Institute. Graham reports, "Judges pointed out that the Enterprise’s public records reporting was, 'A fantastic example of a small paper doing big work to effect real change in the local community.'"

The Institute for Rural Journalism, which is based at the University of Kentucky, presented Zaitz with the Tom and Pat Gish Award for tenacity, courage and integrity in rural journalism in 2018 during the early stages of his reporting on the project. 

One lawsuit over the Marion County newspaper raid settled for $235,000, but more claims are pending

Marion County Record raid, Gruver's desk at bottom right
(Screen capture of surveillance video via Kansas Reflector)

It has been almost a year since the Marion County Record was raided by police supposedly investigating charges of identity theft and illegal use of a computer by the Kansas weekly newspaper. In the process of confiscating newsroom property, the city's chief of police, Gideon Cody, injured Record reporter Deb Gruver's hand while "forcibly obtaining her personal cellphone," reports Emmett Lindner of The New York Times. "Gruver has reached a $235,000 settlement as part of a lawsuit she filed over the search, which set off a national discussion about press freedoms."

Gruver, who resigned from the paper after the raid, "said in a letter to the editor that she 'no longer wanted to work in a town where the majority of leaders clearly don’t respect the Fourth Estate or the U.S. Constitution,” The Record reported.

Another lawsuit, filed by the Record's publisher, Eric Meyer, alleges that the raid, which included "seven law enforcement officials spending more than two hours in Meyer’s residence, where his mother was at the time" contributed to her death the next day, Linder reports. Four other Record employees also have suits pending.

While Gruver's settlement ends one chapter of the raid's fallout, the entire investigation and the later reversal of the authorized searches that allowed it are still more broadly worrisome, particularly for smaller newspapers that investigate local authorities. Linder explains, "Less than a week after the raid, Marion County’s top prosecutor, Joel Ensey, ordered officials to return the seized devices because there was insufficient evidence to justify the searches. . . .The raid also came after The Record had questioned Cody about his departure from the Kansas City Police Department, following accusations that he had made sexist and insulting comments."

The raid didn't just have negative outcomes; there was also a silver lining. Meyer told Linder, "One of the things that we’ve seen out of this is that the people who have responded to us have come from across the political spectrum. There aren’t too many things in this world right now that bring Democrats and Republicans together.”

Eric Meyer and Marion County Record, Kansas paper raided by police chief it was investigating, win Tom and Pat Gish Award for courage, integrity and tenacity in rural journalism

Eric Meyer with his weekly newspaper

Eric Meyer and the staff of the Marion County Record in Marion, Kansas, are the winners of the 2024 Tom and Pat Gish Award for courage, integrity and tenacity in rural journalism, presented by the Institute for Rural Journalism at the University of Kentucky.

Meyer and his weekly newspaper have become a touchstone for freedom of the press since August 2023, when local police raided his office and his home and confiscated computers, reporters’ notes and cell phones, ostensibly investigating charges of identity theft and illegal use of a computer. It didn’t take long for some motives to be apparent: city officials’ desire to punish the newspaper for its investigation of the police chief’s questionable employment background and its reporting on the mayor’s alleged ethics violations and other activities. A few weeks later, the chief was suspended, and three days later, he resigned.

Five days after the raid, the county attorney withdrew the warrants signed by a local judge, saying they were “legally insufficient,” and the confiscated items were returned. But in the meantime, Meyer’s 98-year-old mother, Joan Meyer, collapsed and died after telling journalists that she was upset and stressed by the raid of her home and the paper where she had worked for 50 years. She said, “These are Hitler tactics, and something has to be done.”

The raid, perhaps unprecedented, sparked international outrage at a time when local newspapers are struggling. Eric Meyer said soon after the raid, “If we don’t fight back, and we don’t win in fighting back, it’s going to silence everybody.” Since then, he and his staff have continued to show the courage, tenacity and integrity often required to deliver good journalism in rural areas. The Record “is uncommonly aggressive for its size,” The New York Times reported. “Meyer said that the newspaper, which has seven employees, has stoked the ire of some local leaders for its vigorous reporting on Marion County officials.”

That profile fits those of other Gish Award winners, including the first winners and the award’s namesakes: Tom and Pat Gish, who published The Mountain Eagle in Whitesburg, Kentucky, for more than 50 years. Their son and successor, Ben Gish, is on the award selection committee. He said of Meyer, “Given today’s political climate, what happened to him in Kansas almost certainly will happen at some other small-town paper when another unfit person wins that county's sheriff’s race.”

Meyer’s family bought the Marion County Record in 1998 to keep it from being sold to a chain. His father, Editor Bill Meyer, had worked there since 1948, and won the Eugene Cervi Award of the International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors in 2002. Eric Meyer returned to his hometown to run the paper during the Covid-19 pandemic after working as a reporter for the Milwaukee Journal and teaching journalism at the University of Illinois.

"Eric Meyer and other journalists at the Marion County Record covered their community with courage, tenacity and integrity long before a shocking police raid brought them international attention,” said Benjy Hamm, director of the Institute for Rural Journalism. “But the raid and its aftermath revealed to a much larger audience that the Marion County Record could not be intimidated, denied or defeated in its pursuit of the truth."

Meyer will receive the Gish Award Oct. 10 in Lexington, Ky., at the annual Al Smith Awards Dinner of the Institute for Rural Journalism. The keynote speaker will be Campbell Robertson, who covers Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia for The New York Times and is based in its Washington Bureau. For updates see RuralJournalism.org.

Other Gish Award winners have been the Ezzell family of The Canadian Record in the Texas panhandle; Jim Prince and Stanley Dearman, current and late publishers of The Neshoba Democrat in Philadelphia, Miss.; Samantha Swindler of The Oregonian for her work at The Times-Tribune in Corbin, Ky., and Jacksonville Daily Progress in Texas; Stanley Nelson and the Concordia Sentinel in Ferriday, La.; Jonathan and Susan Austin of the Yancey County News in North Carolina; the late Landon Wills of the McLean County News in Kentucky; the Trapp family of the Rio Grande Sun in northern New Mexico; Ivan Foley of the Platte County Landmark in northwestern Missouri; the Cullen family of the Storm Lake Times-Pilot in northwest Iowa; and Les Zaitz of the Malheur Enterprise in eastern Oregon. In 2019, the award went to three reporters whose outstanding careers revealed much about the coal industry in Central Appalachia: Howard Berkes of NPR; Ken Ward Jr., then with the Charleston Gazette-Mail; and his mentor at the Gazette, the late Paul Nyden. In 2020 the award went to the late Tim Crews of the Sacramento Valley Mirror; in 2021 to the Thompson-High family of The News Reporter and the Border Belt Independent in Whiteville, N.C.; in 2022 to Ellen Kreth and the Madison County Record of Huntsville, Ark.; and in 2023 to Craig Garnett of the Uvalde Leader-News in Texas.

Next week is Sunshine Week. Get ready to showcase how journalism works to preserve open government.

Sunshine Week begins this Sunday, March 10, with multiple ways to highlight how journalists support open government as watchdogs and First Amendment advocates. As Americans face another election cycle, it's an impactful time to remind all citizens that good reporting dynamically supports our democratic process.

Among Sunshine Week's tools, are a social media kit, logos, and timely promotions. If you are writing a news story, editorial or column about freedom of information, tips from the Society of Professional Journalists are also available.

The week's offerings include in-person and online events and activities, including a Sunshine kick-off by the Department of Justice and a panel discussion to raise awareness of Sunshine Laws sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Kansas City/Jackson-Clay-Platte Counties.

Sunshine Week was launched in 2005 by the American Society of News Editors, now the News Leaders Association. This year's events are supported by a growing list of partners, including Brechner Freedom of Information Project, Muckrock, the Society of Professional Journalists and the Radio Television Digital News Association.

In a surprising move, giant publisher Penguin Random House is actively fighting book bans

A wall of banned Penguin Random House books.
(Photo by Nate Langston Palmer, WSJ)

When it comes to fighting book bans, book publishers have hugged the sidelines and quietly funded industry groups that champion First Amendment rights. But for one publishing giant, stepping into the book boxing ring has meant standing up for free speech and its authors, reports Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg of The Wall Street Journal. Penguin Random House "now fully embraces the fight against book bans, entering a sensitive debate that is playing out in school boards and statehouses across the country. At risk: potentially alienating a large chunk of customers on an issue at the crux of culture wars that have polarized the nation in ways not seen in decades."

Those who push for book bans often "believe they are targeting titles that are pornographic or otherwise inappropriate for young people," Trachtenberg writes. "The publisher's stance is that teachers, librarians and school administrators, as expert educators, already make decisions about what is appropriate for young readers, and should be left to do their jobs. . . . Despite the risks, Penguin Random House's leadership said that failing to act had moral and financial costs."

To that end, Penguin Random House has used its media might to resist bans, educate consumers and share "censored" content. "Penguin Random House has started hosting anti-book-banning events, giving away several thousand copies of its most-frequently banned titles," Trachtenberg reports. "School boards and school districts removed more than 1,500 book titles from an assortment of publishers from public school classrooms and libraries in the 12 months through June 2023, according to a recent study by PEN America, a literary and free-speech organization that has been vocal in opposing bans."

Trachtenberg reports, "When Dan Novack, Penguin Random House's associate general counsel, learned the law firm Ballard Spahr was working on a book-banning lawsuit against Escambia County School District in Florida with PEN America, he called an attorney there and asked, 'Can we get in? . . . In an early victory, a federal judge ruled the plaintiffs in the Florida case can pursue their lawsuit on First Amendment grounds."

Taking a hard line against book bans has opened Penguin Random House to deeper probes by media and well-funded book ban advocates. Despite the added scrutiny, the company's leadership feels their position supports educators. Penguin Random House CEO Nihar Malaviya told Trachtenberg: "There is always the potential for people to misinterpret our actions. We aren't pushing anything on anyone. We're supporting the experts who make decisions about books."

Alabama newspaper reporter, publisher arrested and charged with revealing grand jury secrets

A publisher and reporter at an Alabama newspaper have been arrested and accused of illegally disclosing grand jury information about the local school district.

Atmore News Publisher Sherry Digmon and reporter Don Fletcher were arrested on Oct. 27 by deputies from the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office. A Facebook post by the newspaper said that they were released on bonds of $10,000.

According to the post: “The charges against Digmon, also the District 6 representative on the Escambia County Board of Education, and Fletcher stem from an article published in the October 25 edition of Atmore News” about an investigation into “the possible misallocation or misappropriation of federal Covid money paid to seven former school system employees.

“That edition also contained a sidebar article reporting that Digmon’s phone and the phone of District 4 school board member Cindy Jackson had been seized by sheriff’s deputies, who served search warrants against the two, each of whom voted against a new contract for Superintendent of Education Michele McClung.”

Atmore News photo

The Committee to Protect Journalists called on local authorities to drop the charges immediately and investigate why the two were arrested. “They should not be prosecuted for simply doing their jobs and covering a matter of local interest, such as the allocation of school board funds,” said Katherine Jacobsen, CPJ’s U.S. and Canada program coordinator. “Journalists play a crucial role in their local communities. Arresting them creates a chilling effect and is a gross misuse of taxpayer funds.”

The Atmore News also reported that Veronica “Ashley” Fore, the county school system’s payroll and insurance bookkeeper, was arrested on similar charges, though the report stated “the reasons behind Fore’s arrest were not known.”

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, “The charge of revealing grand jury secrets is a felony under Alabama Criminal Code Section 12-16-215, according to court documents reviewed by CPJ, and carries a penalty of between one to three years imprisonment and a fine of up to $5,000.”

In August, police officers raided the offices of the Marion County Record in Kansas and seized computers and other materials such as cell phones, accusing the newspaper of identity theft and unlawful use of a computer. The raid attracted national and international attention and was condemned by many journalists and free press advocates. 

The local county attorney later concluded that there was not enough evidence to warrant the raid, and a judge ordered the materials to be returned to the newspaper. The Record had been investigating the police chief’s employment history at the time of the raid, though police said that reporting was unrelated to their search. The police chief has since resigned his position.

Rural journalists 'knit communities together', have answers for problems in journalism, says USA Today's Susan Page

Susan Page listens to a question as moderator Benjy Hamm, director
of the Institute for Rural Journalism, listens. (Photo by Patti Cross)

"Rural journalism has some of the answers for all sorts of journalism, lessons on covering the news, and earning trust from our readers and viewers," Susan Page of USA Today told 175 people gathered Thursday night for the annual Al Smith Awards Dinner in Lexington, Ky.

"Local news is more trusted than national news," Page noted, citing the latest Gallup poll that found only 7 percent of Americans "have a great deal of trust in what we report and write? . . . Why? You are connected to your communities. You cover the news that matters most to your readers. If you get something wrong, you’re going to hear about it from your next-door neighbor. That really increases the pressure to get things right, and to correct them when you don’t. Those are qualities that every news organization ought to aspire to as well. That’s the lesson of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues."

The institute, which publishes The Rural Blog, holds the dinner with the Bluegrass Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists to present student scholarships and the Al Smith Award for public service through community journalism by Kentuckians, named for the late publisher who co-founded the institute at the University of Kentucky.

"I’m honored to share the stage with the scholarship winners and with Ben Gish and Sam Adams of The Mountain Eagle" in Whitesburg, Ky., said Page, USA Today's Washington Bureau chief. "Congratulations for your coverage, so crucial to your community, of last year’s historic flood in southeastern Kentucky, which cost 45 people their lives."

The dinner also heard video remarks from Craig Garnett, editor-publisher of the Uvalde Leader-News in Texas, winner of the 2023 Tom and Pat Gish Award for courage, integrity and tenacity in rural journalism. He couldn't attend but will receive the award at an event in Texas this winter. Page praised him for "holding to account officials in the aftermath of that terrible school shooting -- well, it takes your breath away. He stood up for those 19 kids and two teachers" who died in May 2022.

Page cited other recent examples of courage in rural journalism: "This summer in Marion, Kansas, my home state, the police chief was so worried about a story that the Marion County Record was working on -- a story about him -- that he got a subpoena and raided their offices. They seized computers and phones in what was a violation of federal law, not to mention the First Amendment. In the aftermath, the police chief has been suspended, and the Marion County Record has gotten its equipment back. And this spring in Idabel, Oklahoma, the McCurtain Gazette-News recorded top county officials discussing wanting to kill one of the newspaper’s reporters while remembering fondly the days when a sheriff could, quote, take a 'black guy, throw him in a cell and beat him.' The sheriff was suspended; the jail administrator was put on leave; one of the county commissioners resigned, and the state attorney general opened an investigation.

"This is what journalists do. This is what journalism does. We also do more. We help readers understand how to file for federal disaster aid after their town is flooded. We track high-school sports. (Does anything attract more readers?) We warn readers when a local bridge has been condemned. We tell them where to go to get the best pizza in town. We knit communities together."

Berkshire Eagle, Seven Days, Vermont Standard, Nantucket paper big rural winners in New England newspaper awards

Slide from awards presentation

The Berkshire Eagle scored big in the New England Newspaper and Press Association awards, which were announced Thursday during the group's semiannual online conference.

The Eagle, of Pittsfield, Mass., was judged the best small daily (less than 9,000 print circulation), with The Keene Sentinel of New Hampshire and the Record Journal of Meriden, Conn., as runners-up. 

The Eagle was judged to have the best editorial, "chastising the Catholic diocese in western Massachusetts for trying to subpoena a reporter's notes which would reveal confidential sources" and calling on legislators to pass a shield law like most other states have to protect reporters. 

And the Eagle won two of NENPA's Publick Occurrences awards, named for America's first newspaper and honoring 13 pieces that were judged to be the best in New England journalism in the past year. The rural or rural-impact winners included the Eagle's reports on nursing homes and hazardous-materials shipments on trains that go through its region; projects by Seven Days of Burlington, Vermont, on child care and the pandemic's impact on housing in the largely rural state; the Lewiston Sun Journal's "Homeless in Maine" series; the Concord Monitor's series on police spending and policies all over New Hampshire; and CT Mirror's "Elder Care Reckoning" series that prompted reforms in Connecticut.

The best small weekly newspaper in New England was judged to be the Vermont Standard of Woodstock, with runners-up the Milton Times of Massachusetts and the St. Albans Messenger of Vermont. The best large weekly (over 4,000 circ.) was the Inquirer and Mirror of Nantucket, Mass.; runners-up were the Martha's Vineyard Times and sister papers in Maine, the Mt. Desert Islander of Bar Harbor the Ellsworth American. The best mid-size daily (circ. 9,000-20,000) was The Day of New London, Conn., with Massachusetts' Daily Hampshire Gazette of Northampton and the Greenfield Recorder runners-up. The Concord Monitor was judged best small Sunday paper.

Few Americans know much about the First Amendment; survey shows only 3% can name all 5 protections

In 2006, 22% of polled Americans could name all 5
Simpsons family members. (Image via NCC)

Americans' understanding of the First Amendment is not getting better with time. In 2006, the McCormick Tribune Freedom Museum commissioned a poll, which revealed that many Americans knew more about the Simpsons than the First Amendment, reports the National Constitution Center. "The phone survey found that only 28% of Americans could name more than one of the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution's First Amendment, but more than half of Americans could name at least two members of the fictional Simpsons family. In addition, 22% of Americans could name all five Simpsons family members, while just 11% of folks knew that freedom of the press was guaranteed under the First Amendment."

Fast forward 17 years: Americans have a breadth of information at their fingertips that 2006 did not offer. Do we know more about the First Amendment? "Survey says: No," reports Sean Stevens of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. "In a recent AmeriSpeak panel conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago, FIRE asked 1,140 Americans if they could name any of the specific rights protected by the First Amendment. . . . Almost a third of Americans could not name a single enumerated right protected by the First Amendment, and another 40% could name only one — usually freedom of speech. Among Americans who named one or more enumerated rights, roughly two-thirds named freedom of speech, about a quarter (26%) named freedom of religion, 20% named the right to assemble, 15% named freedom of the press, and 8% named the right to petition. Only 3% of Americans could name all five and, on average, could name 1.33 First Amendment rights."

Fire's survey also revealed that older Americans and citizens with a bachelor's degree had more First Amendment knowledge. But what can be done to help the rest of the country? "Americans cannot protect, preserve, and exercise their rights if they don't know what those rights are," Stevens writes. "But, there exists a ray of hope, as the Freedom Forum has also consistently found that high school students who have taken classes that include content about the First Amendment are more supportive of free speech rights. This suggests that a culture of free speech can be fostered by increasing knowledge of the First Amendment."

FIRE image

To help support First Amendment learning, FIRE offers a variety of free courses on the First Amendment, including "The History of Free Speech," "Can I Publish This?" and "The Case for Radically Free Speech," Steven reports. "We provide college orientation materials and maintain a syllabus database of courses that focus on freedom of expression. We also provide teaching resources to help K-12 teachers enrich and supplement their existing instruction on the First Amendment. We even send out complementary copies of our comic book, "Finding Your Voice," which shows teens the empowering effects of knowing and using their First Amendment rights."

Saturday is "Let Freedom Read Day," and organizers are promoting efforts to defend library books from censorship

Public libraries should have materials for everyone in the community, but with the increase in book bans, it can feel like the freedom to find "your thing" to read could be pulled from the shelf.

Tomorrow, Oct. 7, is Let Freedom Read Day. In the spirit of civic engagement, advocacy groups are asking Americans to stand up for library staff, educators, writers, publishers and booksellers who make the wide variety of books available to readers.

The organizers of Banned Books Week promote several ways for people to support the efforts:

Call a decision maker: Call school and library administrators, school board and library board members, city councilpersons, and elected representatives to ask them to support the right to read a variety of books. Find and Contact Elected Officials (usa.gov)

Support an advocacy organization: The Banned Books Week Coalition includes organizations that fight against efforts to ban books. Learn more about the members of the Coalition here.

Buy a "banned" book: Censorship doesn’t just harm libraries and schools; it also impacts writers, publishers and booksellers. Writers have had school visits canceled. Publishers and booksellers are encountering more obstacles to working with schools and libraries. One way to support the people who make and sell books is to buy them.

Do you want to help others access banned books? You can donate the books you purchase to:

• Public and school libraries: Contact your local library or school to find out what they need and how to donate.
• Little Free Library: Use the free LFL mobile app to find a Little Free Library book-sharing box in your area.
• Fundraisers: Many public libraries have friends of the library groups that use donated books to raise money for the library.
• A banned book giveaway or bookmobile: Call your local bookstore to see if they may be hosting a giveaway or supporting a bookmobile. 

More ideas are here.

It's Banned Book Week, and First Amendment advocates push back by training citizens how to fight bans

Photo via PEN America

Banned Book Week is this week, and First Amendment advocates are pushing to stem the tide of books removed from library shelves. "In the last few years, there has been an unprecedented wave of book bans and censorship spurred by parents and conservative groups to target books that center the LGBTQ+ community, Black history and diverse stories," reports Ariana Figueroa of The Kentucky Lantern. "During the 2022-23 school year, book bans occurred in 153 districts across 33 states, according to the PEN America report."

According to PEN, 3,300 books were banned during the 2022-2023 school year, up 33% from the prior year. To counter the dramatic increase, PEN "launched online training for students to fight book bans, and more recently, teamed up with bestselling authors to fight against book bans in Florida and across the country," Figueroa writes. "Some of those authors include Judy Blume, Ruby Bridges, Suzanne Collins, Michael Connelly, Gillian Flynn, Amanda Gorman, Nikki Grimes, Daniel Handler, Khaled Hosseini, Casey McQuiston, James Patterson, Jodi Picoult and Nora Roberts, among others."

Lawmakers have also entered the fray, with some supporting bans and others criticizing bans as free speech violations. In September, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee "held a hearing to discuss the consequences of book bans, but senators ultimately decided it was not Congress' role to intervene," Figueroa reports. "The White House in June announced that the Department of Education Office for Civil Rights would appoint a coordinator to counter the massive wave of book bans across the country.. . . However, the department has not responded to multiple requests from States Newsroom asking about the hiring status of the new coordinator. . . . One state, Illinois, became the first state to pass a law outlawing the banning of books."

Moms for Liberty, an organization formed in 2021, is often the force behind many book bans, Figueroa explains. The group generally "'targets local school board meetings, school board members, administrators, and teachers to push right-wing policies,' as reported by Media Matters. Moms for Liberty has about 300 chapters across 47 states."

States and the number of books they have banned from July 2022 – June 2023 include:
Arkansas - 4 books; California - 1 book; Colorado - 8 books; Florida - 1,406 books; Georgia - 4 books;
Idaho - 25 books; Indiana - 3 books; Iowa - 6 books; Kansas - 7 books; Kentucky - 3 books; Maine - 13 books; Massachusetts - 1 book; Michigan - 39 books; Minnesota - 1 book; Missouri - 333 books; Nebraska - 6 books; New Hampshire - 1 book; New Jersey - 3 books; New York - 6 books; North Carolina - 58 books; North Dakota - 27 books; Oklahoma - 2 books; Oregon - 38 books; Pennsylvania -
186 books; South Carolina - 127 books; South Dakota - 2 books; Tennessee - 11 books; Texas - 625 books; Utah - 281 books; Virginia - 75 books; West Virginia - 2 books; Wisconsin - 43 books
Wyoming - 15 books

UPDATE: Police chief who led raid of Marion County Record resigns; questions raised about role of county attorney

Gideon Cody
(Photo by KSHB, Kansas City)

The police chief who led a raid on the Marion County Record newsroom has resigned just three days after being suspended, reports Eric Meyer of the Record.

The resignation by Marion (Kansas) Police Chief Gideon Cody was effective immediately. Mayor David Mayfield made the announcement at a meeting of the Marion City Council on Monday, according to Meyer.

Patrol officer Zach Hudson has been named as the interim chief, and "is the sole remaining member of the Marion police force fully certified as a law enforcement officer," Meyer reports.

Hudson told Meyer after the appointment that he would resume giving the newspaper "weekly reports about police activities. Cody had stopped a 50-year tradition of providing such reports after taking office four months ago," according to the report.

Hudson was present for the Aug. 11 raid on the newspaper, Meyer reports, and called Cody's attention to a confidential file that contained information the newspaper had obtained about Cody's alleged problems while working with another law enforcement agency. The fallout from the Marion County Record newsroom raid continues as the police chief who led the raid has been suspended from his job.

Mayfield suspended Cody last Thursday, reports Phyllis Zorn of the Record. Mayfield had previously resisted calls to suspend Cody until the Kansas Bureau of Investigation released its review. KBI's investigation is ongoing, and it is unclear what made Mayfield change his mind. The city's code allows the mayor to suspend a city official, but only the council has the authority to fire one.

Police body camera footage recorded this file during the raid.
(Marion County Record photo)

Previous reporting on the raid noted that Cody was being investigated by the Record, and he did not want their negative findings published. "Newly reviewed body camera video of the Aug. 11 raid reveals that police went out of their way to inspect confidential material a Record reporter had obtained about Cody's misdeeds with the Kansas City Police Department," Meyer reported. The video showed a file labeled "Capt. Gideon Cody," but there is no recording of to what extent Cody reviewed the file, if any.

The Record has also uncovered evidence that the county attorney, Joel Ensey, knew about the search three days prior to it occurring, according to the news site TheMessenger.com. Meyer reports, "Ensey eventually withdrew the warrants, which he admitted were 'legally insufficient,' but did not do so until five days after the raid. The Messenger.com reported that among more than 200 emails it received was a lengthy email. . . that Cody had sent to Ensey three days before Cody obtained the search warrants."

"When KBI eventually does release its report, it typically would go to the county prosecutor -- in this case, Ensey," Meyer adds. "The Record plans to ask for a special prosecutor to be appointed instead."

Marion County Record raid shows rural newspapers' vital role in government; International Democracy Day is Sept.15

Friday, Sept. 15, is International Democracy Day, a day the United Nations set apart to remind everyone living in a democratic society to celebrate their hard-won freedoms and to refocus on each citizen's responsibility to protect those liberties.

For rural newspapers, this year's raid on the Marion County Record's newsroom was a sobering reminder of how mutable democracy is without the free press. Our community newspapers are the first voice of the people, and pushing to maintain your local presence is a service to your community and, more broadly, your country.

"We all need to speak out. . . . The recent raid on The Marion County Record in Kansas was a shockingly flagrant disregard of the Constitution and, unfortunately, underscores a deeply concerning trend of governmental overreach and attempts to intimidate the press in the U.S.," Tim Regan-Porter, CEO, Colorado Press Association, told Gretchen A. Peck of Editor & Publisher. "Such interference in the press' ability to hold government accountable threatens democracy itself and should concern not only members of the press but all citizens. As champions of free speech and democracy, it's imperative for the industry to unite against such unconstitutional strong-arm tactics and safeguard the essential role of the press in society."

According to a statement from The Committee to Protect Journalists' President Jodie Ginsberg, "Local news providers are essential in holding power to account—and they must be able to report freely, without fear of authorities' overreach." Peck adds, "News publishing advocates also expressed support and solidarity with the local news publisher."

Part of the Sept. 15 celebration can be recognizing that in the case of the Record, the U.S. press stood behind a community newspaper as it pushed fearlessly onward to do its job--supporting democracy with good community journalism.

Kansas reporter files federal lawsuit against police chief who confiscated her personal cell phone during raid

Marion County Record raid, reporter Deb Gruver’s desk appears bottom right.
(Record screen capture of surveillance video via Kansas Reflector)

A Kansas reporter says she is standing up for journalists across the country by filing a federal lawsuit against the police chief who confiscated her cellphone as part of a raid on the Marion County Record, reports Josh Funk of The Associated Press. The lawsuit was filed Wednesday. “Deb Gruver believes Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody violated her constitutional rights when he abruptly snatched her personal cellphone out of her hands during a search where officers also seized computers from the Marion County Record’s office, according to the lawsuit. That Aug. 11 search and two others conducted at the homes of the newspaper’s publisher and a City Council member have thrust the town into the center of a debate over the press protections in the First Amendment."

In previous statements, Cody said the search was prompted by a complaint from a local restaurant owner who claimed reporters used illegal means to access her driving record, which included DUI arrest. Gruver’s filing indicates the raid went well beyond the warrant’s scope. “The lawsuit says that the warrant expressly said that the search was supposed to focus only on equipment that was used to access those records, which was done by another reporter at the paper. But after Cody handed Gruver a copy of the warrant and she told him that she needed to call the publisher, he quickly grabbed her personal phone,” Funk writes. “One of the officers even read Gruver, another reporter and an office administrator their Miranda rights before forcing them outside in the heat to watch the three-hour search.”

According to Funk's report, "Legal experts believe the raid on the newspaper violated a federal privacy law or a state law shielding journalists from having to identify sources or turn over unpublished material to law enforcement." While authorities have returned the Record's computers and cellphones, Record Publisher Eric Meyer said it would use a forensic examination "to find out whether law enforcement had accessed or reviewed any of their records." 

Small-town feud led to a raid that sent a shock through U.S. journalism; weekly paper is 'perhaps a little emboldened'

The first post-raid issue of the Marion County Record
(Photo by Chase Castor, The Washington Post)

"A police raid without precedent on a weekly newspaper alarmed First Amendment advocates. The real story of how it happened, though, is rooted in the roiling tensions and complex history of a few key community members," The Washington Post says above the most comprehensive report of the episode at the Marion County Record, written from Marion, Kansas, by Jonathan O’Connell, with help from Paul Farhi and Sofia Andrade in Washington.

Many of the details have been reported; Kari Newell, a business owner and restaurateur, and a newly hired police chief, Gideon Cody, wanted to avoid having their pasts investigated and possibly exposed by the newspaper. Newell said the Record is "like Geraldo [Rivera] meets the National Enquirer," the Post reports, and when Record reporter Deb Gruver asked Cody "about the career change that had brought him to this prairie community of 1,900 people," he set an initial "print that and I'll sue you" tone and stopped releasing the daily police logs, Publisher Eric Meyer said. "Cody told The Post that his review led him to believe these disclosures could violate privacy laws," an assertion that appears to have no basis in fact since the logs had been published for decades.

"At an Aug. 7 city council meeting, the tension among Cody, Newell and the Record exploded into public view," the Post reports. "During a hearing about her liquor-license application, Newell furiously alleged to the room that the Record had illegally obtained her driving record." The Post explains: "A couple of Marion residents — including Newell’s estranged husband — had circulated a screenshot of a page from a state database showing that the restaurateur had 15 years ago lost her driver’s license following a drunken-driving conviction." A later police affidavit alleged that a City Council member "intended to use the document to challenge Newell’s attempt to renew a liquor license," and the screenshot also made it to Record reporter Phyllis Zorn. To confirm the information, Zorn "went to the website for the Kansas Revenue Department and searched Newell’s name, plugging in certain personal information gleaned from the screenshot — Newell’s date of birth and driver’s license number — so she could access Newell’s record."

At that time, before the council meeting, "The Record decided against publishing a story — just as it had taken a pass on the murky accusations about Cody last spring. Meyer said he was uneasy with how the newspaper’s original tipster had obtained Newell’s record. Instead, he said, he privately let the police chief know that he had received some information about Newell that the original sources may have accessed illicitly. He said he also volunteered to the chief his suspicion that Newell had been driving without a license." When the matter went public, the paper published a story quoting Newell as "saying after the meeting that people all around Marion were high-fiving her for 'finally standing up to the Record'," the Post notes. The next day came the raids on the newspaper, the council member's home and the home Meyer shared with his 98-year-old mother (who died the next day), based on Cody's affadavit saying that Zorn was “either impersonating [Newell] or lying about the reasons why the record was being sought,” which are limited under Kansas law. The alleged crimes were unlawful use of a computer and felony identity theft, but the Revenue Department said later that Zorn's use of its website was legal.

"By day’s end, the story of how police swarmed the Record’s brick storefront offices and Meyer’s nearby home — walking off with computers, servers and a backup hard drive . . . was major news in Kansas and drawing attention beyond the state," the Post reports. Gabe Rottman of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press told the Post, "I think everyone realized how much of an existential threat this was." Such groups have "raised concerns about an overt strain of antipathy toward the media increasingly displayed by some politicians and public officials since the dawn of the Trump era," the Post notes. "Yet an actual raid by police represented a kind of government intrusion on media operations that none could remember seeing in this country. Federal law generally protects journalists from search warrants or raids, requiring law enforcement investigating a crime that reporters may have information about to use subpoenas or voluntary cooperation instead."

In an interview with Brooklyn-based journalist Marisa Kabas of The Handbasket, a Substack newsletter, Meyer "revealed the until-then-secret fact that the Record had been investigating Cody’s career in Kansas City and implied a possible connection to the raid," the Post reports. Cody told the Post, "I have no vendetta against them" and said, “How am I supposed to look the other way when I have a victim who says, ‘Are you going to do anything about this?’” Cody "noted that he had no unilateral power to launch the raid, which he said was approved by a county attorney and a local judge," but five days later the county attorney withdrew the warrant and the police returned seized items to the paper, promising to destroy a copy they made of one hard drive, which Meyer fears may have contained confidential information about the newspsper;s investigations.

"The Record continued its work as usual — or perhaps a little emboldened," the Post reports. "Gruver finally began publishing the reporting she had gathered about Cody’s Kansas City tenure last spring, including blistering, subjective and highly personal criticism attributed to sources who remained anonymous. It was the kind of reporting that previously gave the Record ethical hesitations — but that it now was going ahead with because 'other news organizations have begun publishing similar accounts from unnamed sources,' she wrote."

When Meyer welcomed reporter O'Connell to the office last week, "another visitor walked in, using a wooden cane for support," he reports. "Sporting cowboy boots and a red Donald Trump ball cap, the man eagerly shook Meyer’s hand," and urged him, “Don’t stop! Keep going!”

O'Connell ends the story: "Out front, a spontaneous memorial had popped up, surrounded by flowers. In the middle sat a framed photo of Joan Meyer," whose death her son blamed on stress caused by the raids.

Kansas paper publishes on schedule despite police seizure of computers etc., which attorney and judge get returned

Marion County Record Publisher Eric Meyer talked with journalists after his weekly newspaper hit the stands Wednesday. The subhead reads "but not silenced". (Kansas Reflector photo by Sherman Smith; for a larger version, click on it.)

Screenshot of MarionCountyRecord.com home page

The Marion County Record published its regular weekly edition today, after an all-nighter, and won another victory when the county attorney and a judge told local police who had seized the Kansas newspaper's computers and other materials last Friday to return them.

“I have come to the conclusion that insufficient evidence exists to establish a legally sufficient nexus between this alleged crime and the places searched and the items seized,” said County Attorney Joel Ensley, who had sought the search warrants. “I have submitted a proposed order asking the court to release the evidence seized. I have asked local law enforcement to return the material seized to the owners of the property.” District Judge Ben Sexton signed the order Wednesday morning, and the property was returned to the paper. Publisher Eric Meyer said it would undergo forensic examination "to find out whether law enforcement had accessed or reviewed any of their records."

Ensley said the Kansas Bureau of Investigation would make a report to him, after which he would decide if there was evidence “to support a charge for any offense.” The KBI said it would continue its work without examining any evidence seized last Friday, The Associated Press reports. Ensley also said he would ask the county District Court to release the affidavit that was the basis for the warrants signed by Magistrate Judge Laura Viar, reports Sherman Smith of the Kansas Reflector.

Viar signed the warrants "under the pretense that [Gideon] Cody, the police chief, had reason to believe a newspaper reporter committed identity theft and unlawful use of a computer," Smith reports. "It wasn’t clear what evidence would support such a search warrant, or if Cody and Viar understood the significance of raiding a newsroom." Katherine Jacobsen, program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said at the newspaper office that "She wasn’t aware of any other example of police raiding a newsroom in United States history," the Reflector reports.

The Record has been investigating Cody's employment history, but has not published a story. Meyer told Marisa Kabas of The Handbasket, a Substack newsletter, "The allegations—including the identities of who made the allegations—were on one of the computers that got seized. I may be paranoid that this has anything to do with it, but when people come and seize your computer, you tend to be a little paranoid."

Though his paper was investigating Cody, Meyer told his department about another then-unpublished investigation, of a local restaurateur, that was prompted by a tip Meyer deemed suspicious. When he told the police, they told the restaurateur, who then complained about the paper at a city council meeting, prompting the Record to publish a story. The warrant mentioned the restaurateur and possible identity theft and unlawful use of a computer. Meyer said the paper merely used a state website to get public information.

The day after police raided his office and the home he shared with his 98-year-old mother, she collapsed and died, and Meyer blamed her death on the raids. Joan Meyer had worked 50 years at the paper, where her husband was an award-winning editor for its previous owner and her son was her co-owner for 25 years. Her funeral will be held Saturday.

"Meyer said his mother would be pleased by the outpouring of support the newspaper has received in recent days," Smith reports. "That includes 2,000 new subscriptions for a newspaper that previously had a circulation of about 4,000." Navy veteran Dennis Calvert "drove from Wichita to purchase a six-month subscription" and told Smith, “What the P.D. did here, in my opinion, from what I know, they are ****ing out of line,” Calvert said. “They are totally off the ****ing board. They’ve lost their morals, man. . . . In my opinion, right now, the police chief should be sitting over here in the jail.”

Police raid of Kansas weekly was prompted by a tip that didn't result in a story until the target publicly complained

Wikipedia map, adapted

Local law-enforcement officers raided the office of a rural weekly newspaper in Kansas and the home of its publisher and his 98-year-old mother Friday, contributing to her death the next day, the Marion County Record reports, telling its own story.

"The raid is one of several recent cases of local authorities taking aggressive actions against news organizations — some of which are part of a dwindling cohort left in their area to hold governments to account," write Steve Lee Myers and Benjamin Mullin of The New York Times. "Raids of news organizations are exceedingly rare in the United States, with its long history of legal protections for journalists."

The Record, in a town of 1,900 in a county of 11,500, "is uncommonly aggressive for its size," 4,000 circulation, Myers and Mullin report. Publisher Eric Meyer told the Times that the weekly "has stoked the ire of some local leaders for its vigorous reporting on Marion County officials," including the employment history of Police Chief Gideon Cody.

Eric Meyer (Photo by Chase Castor for The New York Times)

The search warrant for the raid mentions restaurateur Kari Newell and cites "potential violations of laws involving identity theft and the illegal use of a computer," the Times reports. After Newell ejected Meyer and reporter Phyllis Zorn from an event with the area's congressman, the paper reported on it, prompting a tip to Zorn that Newell was trying to get her driver's license reinstated from a 2008 DUI charge so she could get a liquor license pending before the state and the Marion City Council. Zorn confirmed the charge via a state website. "Newell said that someone had unlawfully used her identity to obtain private information about her online," the Times reports.

"Meyer decided not to publish a story about the information, and he alerted police to the situation," report Sherman Smith and Sam Bailey of the Kansas Reflector, quoting him: “We thought we were being set up.” Police told Newell, "who then complained at a city council meeting that the newspaper had illegally obtained and disseminated sensitive documents, which isn’t true," the Reflector reports. "Her public comments prompted the newspaper to set the record straight in a story published Thursday." The raid came at 11 a.m. the next day.

"Newell framed the dispute as a straightforward violation of her privacy by the newspaper rather than a First Amendment battle," the Times reports, quoting her: “I firmly believe that this was a vindictive move, full of malice,” which she says was caused by her ejection of the Record from the meeting at her restaurant, John Hanna and Mergery Beck of The Associated Press report. In another story, they report widespread criticism of the raid. Editor & Publisher has a roundup.

Meyer is a former reporter for the old Milwaukee Journal and a retired professor at the University of Illinois, "whose father worked at the newspaper from 1948 until he retired." Meyer bought the paper in 1998 to keep it from being sold to a larger chain, the Reflector reports. He told the Times that much is at stake: “If we don’t fight back, and we don’t win in fighting back, it’s going to silence everybody.”

UPDATE, Aug. 15: Bill Ketter, senior vice president of news for Community Newspaper Holdings Inc., one of the larger chains, wrote a column for CNHI papers in which he says "Anti-press rhetoric has also whiplashed small town America at a time when local newspapers are more needed than ever. They are a cornerstone of rural democracy."

'These are Hitler tactics and something has to be done.'

Meyer pronounced her first name "Joann." 

“These are Hitler tactics and something has to be done.”

Those were some of the last words said by Joan Meyer, 98, a newspaperwoman for 70 years, after police in Marion County, Kansas, raided her son Eric's newspaper and their home Friday, acting on a warrant obtained by a local restaurateur who apparently feared that the Marion County Record was going to publish a story, based on public records, that would keep her from getting a liquor license. The next day, Meyer collapsed and died, after telling journalists that she was upset and stressed by the invasion of her home.

 

"The crux of the police investigation seems to be whether the paper and its reporters committed identity theft and/or unlawful acts concerning computers in confirming Newell’s driving records. An affidavit justifying the warrant is being withheld by County Attorney Joel Ensey, whose brother owns the hotel where Newell has her restaurant," the editorial boards of The Wichita Eagle and the Kansas City Star said in a joint editorial.

"There could very well be more sinister motives in play here, involving the police chief himself. [Gideon] Cody was hired by Marion in April, after taking an early retirement from the Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department, where he was a captain. According to Eric Meyer, the Record has been actively investigating the circumstances surrounding Cody’s departure from the KCMO department. Friday’s raid gives Cody and his subordinates access to reporters’ notes and materials from confidential sources who were interviewed as part of the newspaper’s investigation." Cody told The New York Times, “I believe when the rest of the story is available to the public, the judicial system that is being questioned will be vindicated,” but declined to discuss details.

UPDATE, Aug. 15: The Associated Press reports, Cody referred questions Monday to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, saying it was leading the investigation. The state agency, in turn, refused to say it had taken over the investigation, referring instead to a statement saying it had “joined” the investigation and seemed to try to distance itself from the raids."

The Kansas City and Wichita newspapers say Magistrate Laura Viar, "or the presiding district judge, should immediately revoke the overly broad search warrant she signed and declare that any evidence seized under it be inadmissible in court. Viar or the district judge should order the immediate return of all equipment and materials seized." We agree. --Al Cross, professor and director, Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, University of Kentucky

UPDATE, Aug. 15: Bill Ketter, senior vice president of news for Community Newspaper Holdings Inc., one of the larger chains, wrote a column for CNHI papers in which he says "Anti-press rhetoric has also whiplashed small town America at a time when local newspapers are more needed than ever. They are a cornerstone of rural democracy."

UPDATE, Aug, 16: The Times honors Joan Meyer with an obituary.

News-media roundup: Local journalism-funding bill filed; source-protection bill moving; another paper goes nonprofit

A new, bipartisan bill with tax credits for local journalism was introduced in the U.S. House Thursday. H.R. 4756 would give payroll tax credits to news media publishers who employ fewer than 750 people and create original content that serves the needs of a regional or local community. The credit could be as much as $25,000 per journalist in the first year and up to $15,000 in the following four years. Local news outlets' small-business advertisers would get credits of up to $5,000 in the first year and up to $2,500 in the subsequent four years if they have fewer than 50 employees.

Rep. Claudia Tenney of upstate

New York, who has been in the

newspaper business, is the main

Republican sponsor of the bill.

The bill is "a conceptual and political breakthrough," Steven Waldman, chair of the Rebuild Local News Coalition, writes for Editor & Publisher. "It makes sense because saving local news should not be about saving journalism jobs per se. It should be about strengthening communities. Politically, if we are to succeed, we need to expand our group of friends beyond other journalism trade groups. A similar bill proposed by Republicans in Wisconsin drew endorsements from the associations representing restaurants, taverns, convenience stores, banks and dentists. . . . We know that passing legislation in this Congress will be a long shot. But this creates the foundation for passage and, in the shorter run, can provide a blueprint for bills in state legislatures."

The legislation is called the Community News and Small Business Support Act and has a long list of endorsers, including the National Newspaper Association and seeveral state press associations. The endorsers include Al Cross, director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues (publisher of The Rural Blog), which is on the steering committee of the coalition. He says, "This bill is one answer to the question we continue to ask: How can rural communities sustain journalism that supports democracy?"  UPDATE, July 24: The bill's Democratic sponsor, Rep. Suzan DelBene of Washington state, discusses it with Brier Dudley, free-press editor of The Seattle Times.

SOURCE PROTECTION: A bill to protect journalists from revealing their sources amid pressure from the federal government cleared the House Judiciary Committee in a unanimous vote Wendnesday, "an unusual show of bipartisanship on a committee often at loggerheads," reports Tim Johnson of Deadline. "The Protect Reporters from Exploitive State Spying Act, or PRESS Act, is a response to instances of law enforcement agencies secretly seeking court orders emails and phone records from reporters in an effort to determine their sources. Lawmakers noted that such instances took place during the Trump and Obama administrations. . . . The bill also restricts efforts to subpoena a journalist’s information from a third party — like phone and internet providers — and gives reporters get an opportunity to challenge such subpoenas in court." There's a companion bill in the Senate.

NONPROFIT AND FREE: The family that owns The Times-Independent of Moab, Utah, is donating the paper to The Salt Lake Tribune, which has been a community-owned nonprofit since 2019. It's one of two weeklies in Moab, with the 10-year-old Moab Sun News, and that's probably why the Trubune is trying a new business model: free circulation to every address in the Zip code and free access online. “That greatly increases the advertising value of the paper,” Publisher Zane Taylor said in an interview. “It’s just a different business model for the future.” In a letter to readers in Thursday's edition, Taylor said the move was “important for The Times-Independent to evolve so it remains essential to all Moabites.” The weekly's local reporters and editors will remain in place, the Tribune said. Sarah Scire has a report for Nieman Lab.

CAPITOL NEWS: Capitol News Illinois, a nonprofit newsroom, is adding news veterans Jennifer Fuller as broadcast director, to expand its offerings to stations, and Molly Parker as part of the investigative team. Parker wiorked with CNI’s Beth Hundsdorfer on the award-winning “Culture of Cruelty” series about patient abuse at a state mental-health center in southern Illinois.

A SALE: HD Media of Huntington, W.Va., which owns the newspapers there, in Charleston and other West Virginia communities, has bought its third weekly in Virginia, The Southwest Times in Pulaski. It bought the Virginia Mountaineer in Grundy and the Lebanon News in the last year.