Media Fight Reporter's Subpoena in Deputy Shooting Case

The attorney general's decision to subpoena Deseret News reporter Pat Reavy in connection with the Jan. 5 shooting death of Millard County Sheriff's Deputy Josie Greathouse Fox is a case of misplaced frustration, according to an attorney seeking to quash the subpoena on behalf of the Deseret News , The Salt Lake Tribune and other news media.

At issue is a Jan. 20 story Reavy wrote after obtaining a search warrant issued to Salt Lake City police in their efforts to locate two suspects in the shooting after they fled Millard County.

Police released the search warrant -- which revealed new information about the man suspected in the shooting, Roberto Miramontes Roman -- after Reavy filed a Government Records Access Management Act request.

Now prosecutors want to question Reavy about "his decision to publish the contents of our sealed search warrant ..." according to a March 17 e-mail from Assistant Utah Attorney General Pat Nolan to media attorney Jeffrey Hunt.

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Subpoenaed Kansas Reporter Loses Job

A Kansas reporter who previously fought to keep a confidential source from local prosecutors has now lost her job.

Reporter Claire O’Brien was terminated last week from her position at the Dodge City Daily Globe after a subpoena battle last month that ended when a criminal defendant accepted a plea deal. County prosecutors had been seeking testimony about O’Brien’s interview with the defendant and the identity of a source she quoted in her story about the case.

The company that owns the Globe, GateHouse Media, and O’Brien appealed the subpoena up to the Kansas Supreme Court and lost. After O’Brien was held in contempt for failing to appear in court, which she said today was “a stupid mistake,” the confidential source revealed his identity to the prosecutors, which allowed her to not testify about him in a private court proceeding known as an inquisition.

O'Brien testified with an independent attorney about her interview with the defendant and said she basically corroborated the information that had already been published.

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