Nexstar, Scripps, Tegna Sue to Block Ind. Law They Say Criminalizes Newsgathering

Indiana’s HB-1186 statute, which took effect July 1 after being enacted April 20, “unconstitutionally abridges” the news media’s ability to fulfill its functions by making it a misdemeanor for journalists to come within 25 feet of police officers who are lawfully engaged in the execution of their official duties, alleged Nexstar, Scripps, Tegna and the Indianapolis Star in a First Amendment complaint Friday (docket 1:23-cv-01805) in U.S. District Court for Southern Indiana in Indianapolis.

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, the Indiana Broadcasters Association and the Indiana professional chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists also joined the complaint, which seeks an injunction enjoining Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita (R) from enforcing the statute.

By criminalizing peaceful, “nonobstructive newsgathering on matters of public importance,” HB-1186 violates the First Amendment “both on its face” and as applied to the plaintiffs, said the complaint. The statute grants police officers “limitless, standardless discretion” to prevent journalists “from approaching near enough to document the way officers perform their duties in public places,” it said.

HB-1186 authorizes police officers “to bar journalists from reporting -- for any reason or no reason -- on an enormous diversity of events of public interest, from a parade or political rally to an arrest or use of physical force,” said the complaint. The statute “applies with equal force” to a reporter gathering the news in a public park, standing on a sidewalk, “or lawfully present at a press conference,” it said.

The statute provides no exceptions for circumstances where 25 feet “is too far -- as it will often be -- for a member of the press to document newsworthy activity, including officers’ own performance of their official responsibilities,” said the complaint. The “breadth and importance of the reporting that will be chilled” if HB-1186 remains in effect “despite its infirmities are difficult to overstate,” it said.

Whenever a journalist receives an order to withdraw while documenting law enforcement activity from a distance of less than 25 feet, “that journalist is put to a choice between committing a crime or forgoing reporting,” said the complaint. For “visual journalists,” 25 feet “is often too far to obtain a clear line of sight to newsworthy events, especially at tumultuous public events like protests,” it said. That distance also is “too great to reliably capture audio of those events,” it said.

The burdens that HB-1186 imposes on journalists are unconstitutional, said the complaint. It violates the First Amendment, and authorizes officers “to issue a dispersal order even if an individual’s presence neither obstructs the officer in the performance of their duties nor poses any other safety risk,” it said. The statute doesn’t require that dispersal orders “be tailored in any way to accommodate the First Amendment right to document law enforcement activity,” it said.