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    Digital Journalist's Legal Guide
    Tablet and mobile phone showing news online

    Everything online journalists need to protect their legal rights. This free resource culls from all Reporters Committee resources and includes exclusive content on digital media law issues.

    Briefs & Comments

    • In re Holmes v. Winter
      May 16, 2013

      Fox News reporter Jana Winter is appealing a decision by a New York judge to enforce a subpoena from a Colorado court demanding that she testify about confidential sources who gave her a notebook of Colorado theater shooting defendant James Holmes' writings. In a brief joined by 42 other news organizations, the Reporters Committee argued that the lower court erred in failing to adequately consider New York's strong public policy protecting journalists and their confidential sources when it applied the law governing subpoena requests from out-of-state jurisdictions.

    • Media coalition letter to the Department of Justice regarding AP subpoena
      May 14, 2013

      The Reporters Committee and 51 news organizations wrote to the Department of Justice, vigorously protesting the overbroad subpoena of two months of phone records of the Associated Press.

    • Hadeed Carpet Cleaning v. Does, Yelp Inc.
      May 8, 2013

      Hadeed Carpet Cleaning filed a defamation suit in Virginia against several anonymous reviewers for comments they posted on Yelp. Hadeed alleges that the reviewers were not actually customers and that their allegations were defamatory, and sought a subpoena to identify them. The trial court issued the subpoena and Yelp appealed to the Virginia Court of Appeals.

    • Affidavit in support of Fox News reporter Jana Winter
      April 8, 2013

      Fox News reporter Jana Winter faces an order to reveal her sources of information in the James Holmes Colorado theater shooting case. The Reporters Committee urged the court to carefully apply the qualified privilege under the Colorado shield law, to allow reporters like Winter to fully report on a case that is of great interest to the public.

    • Moloney v. Holder
      December 19, 2012

      Boston College researchers Ed Moloney and Anthony McIntyre are appealing a First Circuit appellate court decision dismissing their challenge of a subpoena seeking confidential interviews the pair conducted with members of the Irish Republican Army and other members of paramilitary and political organizations involved in the "Troubles" in Northern Ireland. The First Circuit concluded that while the scholars had standing to raise a constitutional challenge the subpoenas, they failed to state a First Amendment claim entitling them to relief. We urge the U.S.

    • In re McCray ("Central Park Five" subpoena)
      November 21, 2012

      "The Central Park Five," a documentary film created by Florentine Films, the production company run by Ken Burns, his daughter and son-in-law, reports the experiences of five men who were wrongfully convicted in participating in the April 1989 assault and rape of a jogger in Central Park. The men are currently in the midst of litigation against the city for damages resulting from those convictions.

    • McFadyen v. Duke University
      November 2, 2012

      Book author and blogger Robert David Johnson is appealing a U.S. Magistrate Judge's opinion denying his request to quash a subpoena from Duke University seeking confidential, non-published communications between himself and several former Duke lacrosse players and their attorneys. Johnson began writing a blog concerning the fallout from a spring 2006 incident in which a stripper hired to perform at an off-campus house party accused several of the players of rape. Duke is facing civil suits from the former players.

    • Amicus brief in Clapper v. Amnesty International USA
      September 24, 2012

      A coalition of attorneys, journalists and labor, legal, media and human rights organizations challenged amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that allow federal officials to monitor international electronic communications even if one party is in the United States. The federal trial court in New York found that the plaintiffs had not demonstrated sufficient harm such that they have standing to challenge the amendments. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York (2nd Cir.) reversed that ruling, and the U.S.

    • Amicus brief in Baker & Baker v. Goldman Sachs & Co. et al.
      July 1, 2011

      Urging the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to affirm the lower court's order granting former Wall Street Journal reporter Jesse Eisinger's motion to quash a subpoena seeking his testimony about non-confidential unpublished information.

    • Amicus brief in Too Much Media, LLC v. Hale
      December 7, 2010

      Urging the New Jersey Supreme Court to reject the Appellate Division's alarmingly restrictive view of who qualifies as a journalist and its implication that a trial court must conduct a full, potentially intrusive hearing to determine whether a person claiming protection under the state shield law is entitled to such.

    • Letter to Commonwealth's Attorney in Harrisonburg, Va.
      April 20, 2010

      Letter regarding prosecutor's order to confiscate newsgathering materials on April 16, 2010 from the newsroom of the James Madison University student newspaper without a subpoena.

    • Comments on proposed Wisconsin shield law
      July 24, 2009

      Urging the state legislature to adopt a shield law that protects reporters' rights to keep sources confidential.

    • Independent Newspapers Inc. v. Brodie amicus brief
      July 28, 2008

      Urging the Maryland Court of Special Appeals to recognize the importance of creating a highly protective standard before allowing litigants to unmask anonymous speakers on Web sites.