Interviews

A state trial court judge in Westchester County ruled this week that a Journal News reporter was entitled to certain records related to an ethics investigation of a former White Plains mayor. The ruling reaffirmed that the disclosure requirements of the state open records law preempt a confidentiality provision for ethics investigations records in a local ordinance.

With anecdotes of bureaucratically tangled interview requests, scripted and chaperoned sources, stalled federal Freedom of Information Act responses and politicized press offices, a panel of health and science journalists speaking at the National Press Club Monday said that many of the government agencies they rely on have failed to live up to the Obama administration's sweeping transparency promises.

The Minnesota Supreme Court rejected a prosecutor’s effort to force The Free Press [Mankato, Minn.] to turn over its unpublished notes from a telephone interview with a gunman.

The high court let stand the appeals court decision, which held that the newspaper did not have to comply with a subpoena to provide the information because of the reporter’s privilege granted by the state’s shield law.

The Environmental Protection Agency responded to various document requests that Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) has been seeking from the agency with a records request of its own regarding interviews that Waxman himself conducted.

Recorded police interviews with the man charged with killing a University of Vermont student will remain sealed for at least a week, a trial judge decided Friday.

Chittenden County Judge Michael Kupersmith held that the audio and video recordings of interviews with Brian Rooney, 37, will be kept private to maintain Rooney’s right to a fair trial and until Kupersmith issues a ruling.