http://www.theledger.com/local/local/16hear.htm Sheriff Keeps Name of Officer Secret, for Now Friday, August 16, 2002 By JOHN CHAMBLISS The Ledger BARTOW -- The Polk County sheriff received a temporary injunction Thursday to stop The Ledger from publishing the name of an undercover officer who shot and killed a man during a July 26 drug raid. Chief Judge Charles Curry also directed Sheriff's Office attorneys to call Circuit Judge Ron Herring today to arrange for a full hearing within the next five days. Curry granted the temporary injunction after a 45-minute hearing that included testimony from Sheriff's Col. Gary Hester. In a statement, Sheriff Lawrence W. Crow Jr. sharply criticized The Ledger. "I am absolutely at a loss to explain why The Ledger will be printing this detective's name. It serves no purpose, other than a tabloid fascination with creating controversy. "If this officer's name is revealed, we will immediately take steps to protect him and his family. We will also be forced to reassign him out of his undercover position, which will interrupt his career development. His training and experience in his undercover capacity will take time and money to replace," Crow wrote. The officer shot and killed Jason Michael Britt, 22, during a raid on Britt's home in Lakeland. Sheriff's officials say Britt was shot after he threatened the officer with a baseball bat and refused to drop it. Because the officer works undercover, sheriff's officials have refused to release his name. It is the first time in memory that a Polk police agency has not disclosed the name of an officer who killed someone. The Sheriff's Office's investigation of the shooting was sent to the State Attorney's Office earlier this week for review. The State Attorney's Office will determine whether the shooting was justified and should release its findings next week. Louis Michael "Skip" Perez, The Ledger's executive editor, contacted sheriff's Col. Grady Judd early Thursday morning to tell him that the newspaper had learned the name of the deputy and was prepared to publish it when the State Attorney's Office report is released. Perez said he called Judd to give him a chance to take whatever measures he thought necessary to protect the deputy, including transferring him or removing him from undercover. "When a government agent shoots someone, rightly or wrongly, an open society has a right to know who it was," Perez said, adding that undercover agents often testify in public trials using their real names. "We're confident this issue will be resolved in our favor soon since there's no precedent in this country's legal history for successfully ordering a newspaper not to print something," Perez said. Ledger attorney Jim Lake of Holland & Knight in Tampa said he was disappointed with the temporary injunction but thinks the newspaper will prevail. Lake said any shooting is of great public interest. "Unfortunately, police are involved in shootings. When that happens, it is newsworthy. "The public interest in this deputy's name is itself manifestly overwhelming -- the death of anyone at the hands of law enforcement is of obvious public concern," Lake said. In a written brief Lake said, "The United States Supreme Court has emphatically stated that prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and the least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights." During the hearing, Lake said Col. Hester told the judge that the undercover deputy had been threatened. In the brief, Lake cited a 1976 case -- The Miami Herald vs. Mcintosh Co. "A party seeking a prior restraint must demonstrate that freedom of speech would constitute an immediate, and not merely likely, threat . . . "The danger to be prevented must not be remote or even probable, it must immediately imperil." "Before First Amendment freedoms can be abridged, substantive evil must be extremely serious and the degree of imminence extremely high." In the brief, Lake wrote the Sheriff's Office has not proven that the threat is high. "This argument ignores the fact that this deputy was removed from undercover work during the Sheriff's Office review of the shooting. Consequently, it is not clear that the deputy is participating in any ongoing investigation (or ever will be again)," Lake wrote. Lake continued by saying the deputy might have already identified himself by testifying in court. "The Sheriff's Office, therefore, has not shown how publication of his actual name will interfere with his work or his safety."