Laredo, Texas: Fifth Circuit Appeals Court Strips Immunity For Officers Who Busted Journalist Priscilla "Lagordica" Villareal For Asking Questions

[Democide]

Cops Arrested Her for Exercising Her First Amendment Rights. They Got Qualified Immunity—but the Appeals Court Wasn't Having It

3 November 2021

Whether you can exercise your First Amendment rights freely depends, in some cases, on where you live and what judges happen to hear your plea, should you try to seek accountability for government reprisal against your civil liberties. One such case is that of Priscilla Villarreal, a journalist in Laredo, Texas, who in 2017 was arrested after publishing two stories that ruffled feathers in the community: one surrounding a U.S. Border Patrol agent who committed suicide, the other which confirmed the identity of a family who had died in a fatal car crash. Villarreal was no stranger to breaking stories ...

Cops Arrested Her for Exercising Her First Amendment Rights. They Got Qualified Immunity—but the Appeals Court Wasn't Having It.

"This is not just an obvious constitutional infringement—it's hard to imagine a more textbook violation of the First Amendment."

reason.com

 

[Democide]

Fifth Circuit Appeals Court Strips Immunity For Officers Who Arrested A Journalist For Asking Questions

5 November 2021

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has finally found some law enforcement officers not worthy of qualified immunity. The First and Fourth Amendment violations were too egregious to be ignored, even with a lack of precedential decisions on point to work with. In January 2018, Laredo (Texas) police officers arrested a local journalist -- Priscilla Villareal, a.k.a. Lagordiloca -- for asking a couple of questions of (and receiving a couple of answers from) another Laredo PD officer. Villareal doesn't work for any local press outlet. Instead, she broadcasts directly to 120,000 Facebook followers, often adding commentary to ongoing events. The ...

Fifth Circuit Appeals Court Strips Immunity For Officers Who Arrested A Journalist For Asking Questions

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has finally found some law enforcement officers not worthy of qualified immunity. The First and Fourth Amendment violations were too egregious to be ignored, even with a lack of precedential decisions on point to...

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