(Toledo) Blade gets $18,000 from government for deleted photos
Source: Toledo Blade
In what was seen as a victory for First Amendment rights, the U.S. government agreed Thursday to pay The Blade $18,000 for seizing the cameras of a photographer and deleting photographs taken outside the Lima tank plant last year.
In turn, The Blade agreed to dismiss the lawsuit it filed April 4 in U.S. District Court on behalf of photographer Jetta Fraser and reporter Tyrel Linkhorn against Charles T. Hagel, then the U.S. Secretary of Defense; Lt. Col. Matthew Hodge, commandant of the Joint Systems Manufacturing Center, and the military police officers involved in the March 28, 2014, incident.
... Mr. Linkhorn and Ms. Fraser were in Lima to cover a news conference at a Ford Motor Co. plant and had gone to take photos of area businesses for future use, including pictures of the tank plant known as the Joint Systems Manufacturing Center. Ms. Fraser took several photos from the entry area of the plant, and the pair were leaving when they were stopped by three military police officers and questioned.
Ms. Fraser showed the officers her Blade identification, but initially declined to provide her driver’s license. She was not driving, and was removed from her vehicle and handcuffed for more than an hour. During the confrontation, the officers repeatedly referred to Ms. Fraser in the masculine gender. She objected and was told by one officer, “You say you are a female. I’m going to go under your bra.”
Read more: http://www.toledoblade.com/Courts/2015/03/06/Blade-gets-18-000-from-government-for-deleted-photos.html
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