U. of Minnesota newspaper upholds First Amendment

The line of separation between the news media and the government is being questioned in the courts of Minnesota. For the past two years, The Minnesota Daily -- the student newspaper at the University of Minnesota -- has been refusing to release unpublished photographs to the court in an assault case currently pending. The photographs were taken at an October 1993 rally against racism on campus that resulted in violence. Kieran Knutson, who was charged with two counts of assault, said he was defending himself from the brass knuckles of Daniel Simmer, the victim. The state attorney subpoenaed the Daily's photographs to see if Simmer had been wearing the brass knuckles during the fight. But although Knutson was acquitted of the charges last week, the issue of the photographs remains unresolved. After several appeals and court hearings, a state appeals judge ruled January 19 that the newspaper had to hand over the negatives to the prosecution. The newspaper will most likely be ordered to pay a $500 fine, but the court has yet to make an official ruling, Daily Editor-in-Chief Michele Ames said. Journalists in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area have raised $1,300 for the student newspaper to be used to pay court fines and part of the Daily's legal fees, Ames added. In a phone conference Tuesday, the Daily asked that the charges be dropped since the Knutson was not found guilty. It also suggested that the court fines be paid to the Minnesota Newspaper Association to supplement its legal fund. But according to Ames, the state is opposed to both proposals. Ames, a graduate student at the University of Minnesota's journalism school, has been found in contempt of court for withholding evidence from the prosecution. The citation will become part of Ames' record. "I would not have pursued this the way that I did had the staff of the newspaper not agreed on the importance of the principle," Ames said. The business and editorial boards of the Daily unanimously voted to withhold the negatives from the prosecutors, Ames said. "There's a very basic principle at stake and that is keeping the press independent from the government," she explained. In a November editorial, the newspaper said the government had not proven that it was essential to the prosecution's case to bypass the Daily's First Amendment rights. "In our particular situation, more than a hundred people were standing at the plaza and that constitutes alternative means from which they could get information," Ames said.