On Tuesday, April 29, 2003, at 07:51 AM, Sunder wrote:

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http://www.sierratimes.com/03/02/28/arpubmg022803.htm

On February 14, a Florida Appeals court ruled there is absolutely nothing illegal about lying, concealing or distorting information by a major press organization.

Ok fine, but what about the old saw that you can't lie to any law enforcement types? Are we to assume that no Law Enforcement Officer ever watches Fox News?

By extension, does that mean any member of the media may lie to a Law Enforcement Officer?

If so, why does does Fox get to lie, and Joe Spudweiser can't?

Ok, what if Joe Spudwiser has his own neighborhood newspaper?

Can't have it both ways. Then again, in this "envrionment" nothing makes sense other than to assume that everyone is lying.

The "making false statements to officers" bit is only about Official Investigations. It doesn't cover lying to your next door neighbor the cop, lying about what speed one was traveling at, or lying on a news broadcast he may be watching. (Even if he's an Official Investigator!) Also, convicting someone of "making false statements" is fairly difficult, and such prosecutions and convictions are rare. --Tim May