June 7, 2002

More on the Trummel Case

There is a Free Paul Trummel web site. Also, yesterday's Seattle Times has a good story on the Trummel case. It's worth reading. Here are some excerpts:

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press in Washington, D.C., the National Union of Journalists in London and Reporters Sans Frontières of France also have questioned whether Trummel is in jail for offensive, but constitutionally protected, web-site content.

"Our concern is that he's being punished for speech on the Internet that should be protected," said Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

In ordering Trummel to stop harassing people at Council House, the judge wrote, "It is my finding specifically that his claim to be a journalist is a bogus claim. ... He is not employed by anyone but himself. There is no publisher involved. There is merely the misguided use of an obviously well-developed talent to write."

Joe Harkins, a New York writer who created the Free Paul Trummel web site, said Doerty's ruling "totally ignores the fact that First Amendment rights are not reserved solely for journalists working for a publication but are the single most basic right guaranteed every person in the USA."

A quick search of the Post-Intelligencer's archives via its web site turned up no stories on the Trummel case, though it did turn up the paper's endorsement of Doerty (published months before he jailed Trummel). A year ago, the P-I published this rather ironic story in which another judge in the same jurisdiction ordered the King County Sheriff's Office to pay more than $13,000 in legal fees for two men the Sheriff's Office sued rather than disclose the last names and ranks of its deputies - information the men were posting on the Internet. The men are entitled to the information under the state's Public Disclosure Act.

Judge Doerty also issued a ruling in that case.

To express your opinion to the Seattle papers on the Trummel case, send emails to:

Seattle Times: opinion@seattletimes.com
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: editpage@seattlepi.com

The Freedom Forum, a leading First Amendment/free press foundation, is carrying the Associated Press version of the Trummel story on its website, here. (Full disclosure: my father-in-law is chairman of the Freedom Forum.)

Tidbits from the AP story: Trummel's lawyers say he was in jail for 63 days before Judge Doerty appointed a lawyer to represent him. Trummel's incarceration is set for court review June 17. Judge Doerty probably could use a few more emails before then. He has two email addresses:
jim.doerty@jdoerty.com or
james.doerty@metrokc.gov