Dear Mayor of Key West, and dear Chief of Police of Key West,
I'm not a journalist, just an ordinary, run of the mill US Citizen, and
I am wondering what the cowboys are doing in Florida!
I am amazed, but ill impressed at the actions reported by on-line
journalist Declan McCullagh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. Your town lies 90 miles
north of a Communist dictatorship, but it would seem to have been swept
south by ill winds of fear and paranoia.
If there is a RIGHT which Americans take seriously, hold near, and very
dear, it is the First Amendment right of Freedom of the Press. For
Shame, Key West, for actions as brutish as Tienaman Square! Your arrest
of Dennis Cooper reflects either fear of exposure of worse wrongs than
Cooper has reported, or a total lack of understanding or respect for the
US Constitution. In light of the recent election results coming out of
Florida, I suspect it is a combination of the two.
Anthony Mournian
San Diego, California
"Police in Key West, Florida have arrested a newspaper editor for
printing
an article that criticized an internal police investigation, according
to
an Associated Press report. This brutish action by police and
prosecutors
should be widely denounced.
As of this afternoon, the Key West newspaper's site at kwest.com was
still
up (I read what appears to be one of the articles in question at
http://kwest.net/~kwtn/local_news/01-06-15-KWTN-FDLE_Investigating_Police_Internal_Scandal.html).
But while the server is still alive -- it responds to ping requests --
connections to port 80 are now refused. Unfortunately, the article is no
longer in my cache.
It looks like the editor, Dennis Cooper, is being prosecuted for
allegedly
violating a state law. Under Florida law, it's a crime to disclose
information about a police investigation -- even if you're the person
who
had filed a complaint alleging police wrongdoing, as Cooper seems to
have done.
You can find contact information for Key West officials here:
http://www.keywestcity.com/directory.html
http://www.keywestcity.com/depts/police/policetelephone.html
I've copied the mayor, the chief of police, and other officials. If they
would care to reply, I would be happy to extend them the usual courtesy
of
distributing their response unedited.
If anyone puts up a mirror site with the article, please let me know.
And I
urge you to write to the city officials copied above. (BTW I have
verified
that the below article did run on the AP wire.)
-Declan
---
From: Eric Cordian <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Journalist Arresting for Criticizing Cops
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2001 08:58:05 -0700 (PDT)
In today's news of the truly odd.
-----
KEY WEST, Fla. (AP) -- A newspaper editor and publisher was arrested for
publishing an article alleging a cover-up in an internal police
investigation he had filed an official complaint about, police records
show.
Dennis Cooper, 66, editor of the weekly Key West The Newspaper, was
arrested Friday and released two hours later on his own recognizance.
The affidavit for his arrest cites a Florida statute that makes it a
misdemeanor for anyone involved in an internal police investigation to
disclose information before it has been entered into public record.
Cooper has alleged a police lieutenant lied in court about a 1996 stop of
a bicyclist, and that the Key West Police Department covered it up.
He filed a complaint last month with the Florida Department of Law
Enforcement accusing an internal affairs investigator of falsifying
information about his review of the incident.
[...]"
