{"id":307564,"date":"2017-05-10T23:07:37","date_gmt":"2017-05-10T22:07:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/action-alert-asking-questions-of-government-figures-is-not-a-crime\/"},"modified":"2017-05-10T23:07:37","modified_gmt":"2017-05-10T22:07:37","slug":"action-alert-asking-questions-of-government-figures-is-not-a-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/action-alert-asking-questions-of-government-figures-is-not-a-crime\/","title":{"rendered":"Action Alert: Asking Questions of Government Figures Is Not a Crime"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dan<\/a><\/p>\n

Mugshot of reporter Dan Heyman, arrested while trying to question a government official (via CNN<\/strong><\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

West Virginia state police arrested Dan Heyman, a veteran reporter with Public News Service<\/strong><\/a>, for repeatedly asking Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price whether being a target of domestic violence would be considered a “pre-existing condition,” allowing health insurance to be denied, under the new Republican healthcare bill.<\/p>\n

The charge: “willful disruption of governmental processes.”<\/p>\n

Capitol police \u201cdecided I was just too persistent in asking this question and trying to do my job and so they arrested me,\u201d Heyman told reporters (The Hill<\/strong>, 5\/9\/17<\/a>). \u201cFirst time I\u2019ve ever been arrested for asking a question. First time I\u2019ve ever heard of someone getting arrested for asking a question.\u201d<\/p>\n

The criminal complain against Heyman said that he was<\/p>\n

\n

aggressively breaching the Secret Service agents to the point where the agents were forced to remove him a couple of times from the area walking up the hallway in the main building of the Capitol. The defendant was causing a disturbance at Ms. Conway and Secretary Price.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The report of the arresting officers appears to contradict that complaint, however; the officers said they \u201cwere able to detain the defendant before he tried aggressively to breach the security of the Secret Service.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

In a statement<\/a>, the ACLU of West Virginia said:<\/p>\n

\n

Dan Heyman was doing his job as a reporter. He was fulfilling that sacred role of the media in a democratic state of holding our elected officials accountable regarding the vital issues of the day. And for that, he was arrested.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The arrest follows the conviction last week of Code Pink activist Desiree Fairooz for “unlawful conduct” because she laughed for three seconds in a Senate conference room when Republican Sen. Richard Shelby said that then-nominee for Attorney General Jeff Sessions had an “extensive record of treating all Americans equally under the law.” She faces up to a year in jail (New York Times<\/strong>, 5\/3\/17<\/a>).<\/p>\n

ACTION:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Please ask West Virginia to respect the First Amendment and drop all charges against reporter Dan Heyman.<\/p>\n

CONTACT:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Secretary Jeff Sandy<\/p>\n

West Virginia Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety<\/p>\n

email: Jeff.Sandy@wv.gov<\/a><\/span>
\nTwitter: @WVDMAPS<\/a><\/p>\n

Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective.\u00a0 Feel free to leave copies of your messages in the comments thread of this post.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>
\nThis piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission from FAIR<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mugshot of reporter Dan Heyman, arrested while trying to question a government official (via CNN) West Virginia state police arrested Dan Heyman, a veteran reporter with Public News Service, for repeatedly asking Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price whether being a target of domestic violence would be considered a “pre-existing condition,” allowing health insurance […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2521,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-307564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2521"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307564\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}