IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) – An Iowa journalist faces trial on Monday for charges arising from her coverage of a protest against racial injustice, a case prosecutors have pursued despite the international conviction of defenders of the free press saying they were just doing their job.
The case of Des Moines Register journalist Andrea Sahouri, who was sprayed and arrested with pepper while reporting a clash between protesters and police, will highlight an aggressive response from Iowa authorities against those who organized and attending protests that erupted last summer and occasionally became violent.
Sahouri and her ex-boyfriend are accused of not dispersing and entering official acts, offenses that could lead to fines and up to 30 days in prison. They face a two-day trial at Drake University in what the US Press Freedom Tracker he says he could be the first of a journalist working nationwide since 2018.
Sahouri’s Diary, the Iowa Freedom of Information Council and Amnesty International they are among the proponents of the press who have demanded that Polk County remove the charges, calling it an abuse of power that violates the first amendment to the Constitution.
“It simply came to our notice then. Reporting in a protest as a member of the media is not a crime. It is a right that must be protected, “Amnesty International said.
But Des Moines police and county attorney John Sarcone’s office argue that Sahouri did not carry press credentials and appeared to be participating in an illegal assembly, saying journalists do not have a free pass to ignore dispersal orders . The only such order identified in the court documents was issued approximately 90 minutes before the arrest.
On Friday, in a pre-trial hearing, prosecutor Bradley Kinkade argued that Sahouri’s occupation as a journalist “is irrelevant to his charges.”
“This is a standard misdemeanor trial,” he said.
Sahouri, recently awarded by the Iowa Newspaper Association, as one of the best young reporters in the state, has continued to cover public safety while the charges have surfaced.
Although 126 journalists were arrested or detained during the 2020 riots, most were not charged or charged, according to the Press Freedom Tracker. Fourteen still face charges.
Sahouri’s determination to prosecute has baffled observers, who point out that Iowa courts have an accumulation of serious crime cases due to the coronavirus pandemic. Critics say authorities appear to be seeking a conviction to justify an officer’s decision to unnecessarily use force against a known journalist to build trust with crime victims and underrepresented communities.
“It’s like someone with their hand in the cookie jar: they can’t admit they made a mistake,” said Des Moines civil rights lawyer Glen Downey, who is not involved in Sahouri’s case. “The case is important for the journalistic aspect, but it is also emblematic of how they treat all the protesters.”
Sahouri, 25, was covering a Black Lives Matter protest at Merle Hay Mall when tensions rose between participants and police. Her boyfriend, Spenser Robnett, was accompanying her for security reasons.
Protesters vandalized a Target store, smashed windows, blocked an intersection and threw bottles of water and rocks at officers with riot gear.
Sahouri covered the protest live on Twitter, reporting that officers charged at a shoe store with rifles and fired tear gas to disperse the crowd.
Sahouri said he was fleeing the gas when Robnett received a projectile and paused briefly to check it before continuing to the corner of a Verizon store. That’s when Officer Luke Wilson approached, shot pepper spray in her face and held her in straps, she says.
Sahouri was repeatedly identified as a press officer, but was taken to prison. She reported his live arrest from the back of a police van.
Wilson has stated that he did not know Sahouri was a journalist until he arrested her and Robnett intervened, saying he was working for the Registry and trying to pull her away. Wilson says he was unable to activate his body camera.
Judge Lawrence McLellan on Friday ordered prosecutors to provide materials for the formation of body cameras in Sahouri’s defense, which he said should have been delivered in response to a previous court order.
The defense argues that Wilson could and should have recovered the video of the arrest after the incident, but refused to do so, potentially to avoid embarrassment. McLellan said he will rule later on whether to instruct jurors that the evidence had been destroyed.
Des Moines Register executive editor Carol Hunter said Sahouri’s lack of press credentials, which he left in his car, is a “red herring” because police immediately knew he was a journalist and not requires a press badge to enjoy constitutional protections. Reporters should be free to witness protests and hold participants and police accountable, Hunter said.
“Press freedom depends on news gathering,” he said. “It’s really an attack on a key part of being able to give people news.”
The newspaper funds Sahouri’s defense, which is headed by former US prosecutor Nick Klinefeldt.
Prosecutors obtained and may attempt to show jury members text messages between Sahouri and protest leader Maté Muhammad from a week after his arrest. His lawyers say the texts are irrelevant and show the routine data collection of a journalist with a source.
Muhammad, who has been fighting accusations stemming from protests, she said she did not know Sahouri when she was arrested, but the two have developed a professional relationship since then. He called it “extremely diligent” to examine information and gather different perspectives.
“We like working with her not because we see her as an activist or by our side,” she said, “but because we see her as fair.”