I'd say that last part is the part that got LAT in trouble... I rarely support the whole "under seal" thing, especially when it's in order to protect a corrupt dirtbag cop, but this "ask for forgiveness not permission" stuff won't fly with many judges...
But yeah, this guy is scum. Not only has he gleefully profited from both sides of the ruinous Drug War, but his police status has allowed him to escape the draconian punishments that normal people suffer.
TFA makes it extremely clear that the First Amendment gives newspapers and others the right to publish information obtained from documents that end up available to public in error. All case law indicates that the LA Times waa acting fully within the boundaries of the law and did not need to "ask for forgiveness" or whatever.
This ruling is extremely unusual and clearly unconstitutional.
Heres is the full redacted part:
>The document was ordered to be filed under seal but appeared on PACER, a public online database for court documents.
>According to the agreement, filed in U.S. District Court, Balian agreed to cooperate with federal authorities by responding truthfully and completely in interviews and court proceedings. He is scheduled to be sentenced in September, when prosecutors are expected to recommend a reduced sentence.
>The charges to which he pleaded guilty carry a maximum sentence of 35 years in prison.
This is entirely speculative, but it seems much more probably than the judicial branch going out of its way to help the executive.
According to the article, the courts have steadfastly protected this behavior for 90 years.
Incidentally, no one would wish to see the cop's family harmed, but it's not like this plea agreement came as a surprise to them, so they already had time to reorganize their lives for security. That makes the seal difficult to justify. Also, the risks they face are mostly due to the cop's actions.
That omits every time a district judge has declined to issue such an order.
In reference to the original post:
> ask for forgiveness not permission
News organizations don't ask permission of anyone before publishing, least of all courts.
Finally, I'll add that if news organizations can publish the Pentagon Papers and Snowden's leaks, certainly they can publish an accidentally leaked plea agreement.
What if this crooked cop gets a job with even a modicum of authority in the future? Surely, insuring this incident shows up in background checks would help future potential employers.
It was an order to protect his family from retribution from violent psychopaths that have in the past murdered not just informants / plea deal recipients, but their entire family in the most bloody way imaginable. I would not be surprised if the headline in a few days is about his wife and children dying in ways unfit to print. And it would be irresponsible journalism of the LA Times that made it happen.
I’m one of the most pro free speech person I know, but I’m squarely with the judge and the right to seal court proceedings here. And with a now gone age of journalism where this crap didn’t happen in the first place.
You cannot create the Memory Hole by court order. LA Times has a constitutional right to print anything they obtain legally. They are not directly placing anyone's lives at risk by publishing.
If anything, they could publish another article about how slipshod security practices in the court system leak sensitive information to the public, and the court system tries to censor journalists rather than investigating and fixing their own problems.
The easiest way to protect the corrupt cop's family would have been to crack down on police corruption, so that no cop could get so deeply involved with a violent criminal organization that their family would ever be at risk. If the gangs couldn't get corrupt cops to cover for them, they would find it much more difficult to murder families for retaliation and intimidation.
Judging by Mexico's example, publishing may also put the journalists and their families at risk.
This is definitely shooting the messenger. In a system where doing that is illegal.
The judge is wrong, and should be reversed. Yesterday.
Drug trade earns money; money buys guns and shooters; guns and shooters protect drug trade.
Yes, yes they are. That is the entire point.
Even "a person is shocked/scared to death by the published information" would require some physiological condition that would enable someone to drop dead from an emotional response, such as heart disease with ventricular fibrillation, or organ failure due to chronic cortisol and adrenaline poisoning.
Perhaps publication of a paradox, like "This article contains no true statements," would kill an overly-logical AI?
The crime triangle of motive, method, and opportunity is closed by the criminal--the one with mens rea, the evil motive--not by anyone who produced any element of the opportunity.
Your assertion is completely unsupportable, and indirectly hostile to freedom of speech, by attributing imagined harms to speech, when their ultimate causes lie elsewhere.
> John Saro Balian, 45, pleaded guilty to one count each of soliciting a bribe, obstruction of justice and making false statements to federal investigators as part of a plea agreement he reached with prosecutors. The document was ordered to be filed under seal but appeared on PACER, a public online database for court documents.
> According to the agreement, filed in U.S. District Court, Balian agreed to cooperate with federal authorities by responding truthfully and completely in interviews and court proceedings. He is scheduled to be sentenced in September, when prosecutors are expected to recommend a reduced sentence.
And it doesn't contain the "corrections" ...
> 5:15 p.m.: This story has been updated to remove references from the filed plea agreement, which was ordered sealed by a judge but publicly available Friday on the federal court’s online document database. The changes were made to comply with an order issued Saturday by a U.S. federal judge. The Times plans to challenge the order.
> 3:40 p.m.: This article was updated with a statement from the Glendale police chief.
> This article was originally published at 10:55 a.m.
And if that goes too, I have a local copy :)