At 1:07 PM -0400 10/5/00, Declan McCullagh wrote:

http://www.cluebot.com/article.pl?sid=00/10/05/1654245&mode=thread

High Court Denies Reporter's Kiddie-Porn Appeal posted by cicero on Thursday October 05, @11:52AM from the so-much-for-a-fair-trial dept.

The Supreme Court this week declined to hear an appeal from a journalist convicted of trafficking in child porn, which means veteran reporter Larry Matthews will be spending some 18 months in prison. Brill's Content has an in-depth article on the case, including how the judge barred Matthews from using the First Amendment as a defense when arguing before the jury. That seems wrongheaded. No matter whether Matthews downloaded nude images for a story or not -- he had deleted them by the time the FBI raided his home -- he should have the right to tell a jury his story. Also see an amicus brief filed by a journalists' group, and a writeup in the Washington City Paper.

Journalists have no special rights. None. They are simply those who are (usually) paid for their words. This does not exempt them from any laws. The First Amendment does not confer special rights to writers; in fact, it says that government may not create such distinctions by "approving" certain journalists. A journalist who buys pot or coke for a story on drug abuse is as vulnerable to the drug laws as any other person (including cops, by the way) who buy drugs. A journalist who buys stolen material for a story or expose is as vulnerable to the laws as anyone else. A journalist called to testify in court is not immune from answering questions that any other person would be required to answer. We are all journalists. I am a journalist, my brother is a journalist, that girl over there is a journalist. Some of us get paid for our work, some are trying to get paid, some are donating their efforts, some use the Net to publish their works. The whole machinery of the "shield laws" is about trying to gain guild status, or official recognition, that certain journalists are exempt from laws affecting the rest of the proles. This is wrongheaded and violates the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. And, yes, a journalist who downloads or possesses certain images is just as vulnerable to laws as any of us is. As to whether he "has the right to tell his story to a jury," I think a judge can instruct a jury that a "reporter doing his research" line of reasoning is not legally permissable. (Judges are responsible for ensuring that bogus legal arguments are not given to juries with finite time to consider such arguments and finite knowledge of the law.) --Tim May -- ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, ComSec 3DES: 831-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, "Cyphernomicon" | black markets, collapse of governments.