) - There’s a small-town legal fight brewing in Escambia County, Alabama, pitting the district attorney against a local newspaper publisher who is also a school board member.The latest development, coming Thursday, is an order by Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Parker appointing a retired Autauga County judge to handle this case. That’s because all three Escambia County judges recused themselves, citing their professional relationship with the defendant.
Escambia County District Attorney Stephen Billy charged the reporter, Don Fletcher, and the publisher, Sherry Ann Digmon, with publishing privileged information from a grand jury investigation. In addition to being publisher, Digmon also is on the school board. This week, a grand jury issued two separate actions against Digmon – an impeachment case and an indictment alleging that she illegally used her position on the school board to gain advertising for a magazine that she has a financial interest in.
Dennis Bailey, general counsel of the Alabama Press Association, points to a 2001 U.S. Supreme Court case, Bartnicki v. Vopper. He said that established the right of a news organization to report on information that someone else illegally obtained – as long as the journalists didn’t coerce someone into breaking the law and the information was an accurate account of a matter of public interest.
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