Gizmodo Iphone drama: Journalist's house raided

[ZDL]

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[SeriousStudent]

Very interesting.

Any California LEO's able to shed light on the claim by Gawker Media that a judge cannot issue a search warrant for a journalist's equipment?

I'm curious as to what is the felony they are claiming Chen committed?

Where's that popcorn-eating smiley when you need it?

[Mac5.56]

Well that's interesting. I am really curious as to how this will play out. With so many changes going on in the structure of journalism this case seems like it could have very major implications. The law seems pretty cut and dry when you consider raiding say the offices of The New York Post, but when you have a collection of freelance, or self employed journalists operating out of home offices it seems like it could get a little blurry.

[Mac5.56]

Very interesting.

Any California LEO's able to shed light on the claim by Gawker Media that a judge cannot issue a search warrant for a journalist's equipment?

I'm curious as to what is the felony they are claiming Chen committed?

Where's that popcorn-eating smiley when you need it?

I'm thinking the felony was probably the "theft" of the 4 Gig Iphone.

[obucina]

how odd, all that whiz bang steve jobs stuff and he rocks a Droid....he does have good taste in foanz

[ZDL]

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[Mac5.56]

One challenge is: are bloggers journalists?

That really seems to be the question of the day! I know that there is a lot of debate right now among News Agencies regarding this very thing. Certain local papers in NY have started up blogs for there most favored journalists, and they have been a success. So these people are essentially still paid for their service by a News Agency.

Then look at like CNN's IReporter. Are all of those contributions done by "journalists"? I would say no. But the work is being published by a News Source, so does this therefore constitute that their media equipment is thus protected under this law???

I think having democratic access to information is beneficial in our society, and that it is one of the primary reasons for the First Amendment. At the turn of the 20th century there were thousands of printed news papers, and it was this Amendment that was critical in many of the social changes that were taking place at the time.

In a lot of ways I feel like we're in the same boat now with blogs. The access to the technology is so easy, that we are going to have millions (rather then thousands) of journalistic sources, but eventually this will slow down when people start getting bought out by competitors, loose interest, or are shut down.

[twitch1706]

The whole issue of confiscating journalistic materials surfaced regarding the JMU riot recently. According to the Privacy Protection Act, journalists' materials may NOT be confiscated under active investigations unless it is thought that the failure to do so would cause harm or death to a human being.

In terms of the JMU case, Harrisonburg police wanted to take 600-some pictures stored on servers of JMU's newspaper to try and identify and subsequently charge people seen breaking the law. To my understanding, JMU lawyers and the Commonwealth's Attorney are in negotiations over the confiscated pictures.

How this applies to the Gizmodo case is completely beyond me, but there does seem to be precedent about confiscating journalists' property.

[Left Sig]

The felony is receiving stolen property - the iPhone.

I read in another article that California law requires lost property to be returned to the owner if the owner is identifiable. That means if you find a wallet with money and ID, it is a crime not to return it to its owner.

In this case, whoever "found" the phone knew it was an Apple prototype thus the property of Apple. The Gizmodo guy knew this and bought it anyway.

And even if it was simply "lost", I'm willing to bet the Apple Engineer will claim he was pick-pocketed to cover his ass.

Now, if the Gizmodo guy received information about the phone, or specification documents, or something like that then the law referenced in the story might apply. But not for actual "stolen" property.

[ZDL]

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