The Kansas newspaper must sue after that outrageous police raid. Here's why.
The Marion County Record's attorney tells me what's next for the small-town weekly — and for press freedom
Bernie Rhodes tells me he has vastly conflicting emotions about an outrageous police raid on the Marion County Record, a Kansas weekly, earlier this month.
“I’m extremely angry,” the paper’s attorney said about the way local cops were able to get a search warrant from an unscrupulous magistrate judge and confiscate the weekly newspaper’s equipment and records.
At the same time, Rhodes is moved and heartened by the outpouring of support for the paper from all over the country — and even the world — from journalists, other media lawyers and regular citizens.
I asked if the paper will take legal action against the local authorities.
“Yes, yes — unless we can get some other resolution,” he told me.
But what could that possibly be, I asked, given the extreme nature of what happened on Aug. 11th?