Today, the Rio Grande Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) learned that a District Court judge has ordered a New Mexico journalist to turn over unedited video from an interview with a source.
Attorneys for a title loan company subpoenaed KRQE -TV investigative producer Jeff Proctor, asking for a broad range of information. SPJ strongly disagrees with the judge’s decision to allow a reporter’s raw interview footage to be used as an arm for civil discovery.
Forcing journalists to produce their working notes or raw video is a serious infringement of our ability to gather news and information on behalf of the public.
As we noted last October, when the New Mexico Department of Health subpoenaed the Santa Fe Reporter’s Joey Peters: “Journalists’ communications with sources are protected to ensure the free flow of information that allows journalists to perform their essential functions in a democratic society: to give people the information they need to participate in the political process—and to hold those in power accountable for their actions.”
Earlier this year, Proctor and reporter Kim Holland reported on the 2010 shooting of U.S. Army veteran Chris Clay:
According to a lawsuit Clay filed in state District Court, [Clay] was shot by an unlicensed repo man who brought along a convicted felon on May 21, 2010, to haul Clay’s 1999 Dodge pickup away from his remote property off U.S. 64 on the outskirts of town for New Mexico Title Loans.
Attorneys for Community Loans of America, which owns New Mexico Title Loans, asked state District Court Judge Sarah Singleton to compel Proctor to release raw video of the interview, notes taken during the course of reporting, a list of sources, correspondence with those sources and testimony regarding contact with those sources. Singleton denied the release of all source information, except for outtakes of the interview with Clay, the plaintiff in the case.
Moreover, SPJ finds it disturbing that attorneys for the title loan company, Community Loans of America, issued the subpoena prior to the airing of the report by Proctor and Holland.
We oppose this attempt to procure information from a reporter and we most certainly oppose the practice of litigants requesting—and being allowed access to—unaired footage obtained by reporters during the newsgathering process.
-Laura Paskus, president, on behalf of the Rio Grande Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. Jeff Proctor is Rio Grande Chapter board member. He was not consulted regarding this statement. For more information, please contact laura.paskus@gmail.com.
Facing the threat of a subpoena, reporters should familiarize themselves with what to do, and contact the Rio Grande Chapter of SPJ.
