What the hell is going on in the District of Columbia? Public officials think they can arrest reporters for shooting video at a public meeting? The guy in this clip is a reporter named Pete Tucker:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfoYSrjNvjQ[/youtube]Here’s Reason producer Jim Epstein’s account of what happened leading up to the arrest (he shot the video above and was arrested and detained when he tried to leave):
About 30 minutes into the meeting, I witnessed journalist Pete Tucker snap a still photo of the proceedings on his camera phone. A few minutes later, two police officers arrested Tucker. I filmed Tucker’s arrest and the audience’s subsequent outrage using my cell phone.
A few minutes later, as I was attempting to leave the building, I overheard the female officer who had arrested Tucker promise a woman, who I presumed to be an employee of the Taxi Commission, that she would confiscate my phone. Reason intern Kyle Blaine, overheard her say, “Do you want his phone? I can get his phone.”
Here’s Epstein on Napolitano’s show discussing the arrests:
Law enforcement representatives have been pushing the boundaries of our rights while claiming that it will make us safer and pro-law enforcement judges have been sanctioning these unconstitutional violations. In California and other states now your cell phone may be confiscated and everything on it downloaded without a search warrant or even probable cause. Agencies have also been fighting citizen review panels, which examine questionable cases for abuse, excessive force, and the violation of citizen’s rights. The TSA and other law enforcement is now arresting people for video-taping their actions. This is in full violation of the “freedom of the press” first amendment rights, open meeting laws and common sense understandings that such video serves as evidence (which could either clear or prove abuse of power by government officials).
Law enforcement officers and jurists who believe in the Constitution and our guaranteed civil rights, should join in vocal opposition decrying this unconstitutional behavior. This acceptance of the old Gestapo tactics into the norm is antithesis and incompatible to our rights and freedoms. It is more proof that America is being pushed further into a socialist police state.