Looking back at raid, 1 year later
Staff writer
At a Sunday gathering in Marion Senior Center, 125 people looked back at a police raid one year to the day earlier on the Marion County Record and the homes of its owners and city council woman Ruth Herbel.
“Unwarranted, the Senseless Death of Joan Meyer,” an award winning documentary produced by the Wichita Eagle, was shown.
So was a video made by the Institute for Justice, which represents former city council member Ruth Herbel in her lawsuit against the police department, sheriff’s office, and other officials.
Wichita folk singer and songwriter Emily Judson performed her original song, “Joan.”
Kansas Press Association director Emily Bradbury led a roundtable presentation by Wichita Eagle video producer Jaime Green, Kansas Press Association legal consultant Max Kautsch, Kansas Reflector editor Sherman Smith, and Kansas Wesleyan University journalism lecturer Paul Green.
All spoke about their memories of the raid and how they reacted then and afterward.
Bradbury, alerted while the raid was ongoing, called other newspapers in the state.
Smith, who was called by Bradbury, immediately sent reporters to Marion.
Paul Green, himself a longtime reporter before becoming a university lecturer, spoke about attitudes toward journalists and how those attitudes color the way the profession is perceived.
“How many of you now trust your local police?” he asked.
Only three hands went up.
“How many of you agree someone needs to face punishment for what happened at the Marion County Record?” he then asked.
Nearly every hand in the room went into the air.
Kautsch said police intended to raid first and maybe investigate afterward.
“What we’ve encountered is a hallmark of American law, in that law enforcement gets away with it,” he said.
Smith pointed to Kansas Bureau of Investigation’s changing stories about its role in the raid.
“What happened here is, I think, a wakeup call,” Smith said.
But if people don’t keep reading, he said, society will just snooze through the call.
Looking at what has changed in the last year, Green said it had been a hard year. She now keeps Kautsch’s phone number everywhere.
Bradbury said KPA has made posters on reporters’ rights and disseminated information on how to respond if a reporter is targeted.
“How are journalists seen?” Paul Green said. “Are they slimy, troublemaking liars, or are they the good guys?”
If nobody is asking questions, nobody will be telling the public what governments are doing, he said.
“The best journalists you’re going to find in America are at small newspapers like Marion,” he said.
Journalists are seen as a threat to those in power, Paul Green said.
“You can see we have a system that wants to protect those in power,” he said.
Kautsch questioned the independence of an investigation done by Colorado Bureau of Investigation agents.
“The KBI deputized the CBI, so is that independent investigation?” he said.
Legislatures are elected by voters.
“Until we get the government we deserve, that’s what is going to happen,” Kautsch said.
Smith said Marion residents were blessed beyond belief to have a newspaper to inform them of things they need to know.
If County Attorney Joel Ensey had taken the time to read the search warrant, would it have been sent to the judge for a signature, he asked.
“Vote people out when they don’t do the job for you,” Smith said. “Vote in ones who will do the job.”
University of Kansas journalism professor Stephen Wohlgast presented findings of a study on implications of the raid.
Bradbury told Record publisher Eric Meyer that he and his mother, Joan, had been inducted into the Kansas Newspaper Hall of Fame.
The person who came the fsrthest to attend the event was Daniel Pocock of Melbourne, Australia. A software engineer, he travels back and forth between Australia and the United States. On his way to a meeting in Chicago, Pocock saw news of Sunday’s event and drove to Marion to see it.