Transparency News 12/12/16

State and Local Stories
 

Nine news organizations are partially siding with Rolling Stone magazine in challenging the jury’s verdict in the recent multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuit won by University of Virginia administrator Nicole Eramo. On Thursday, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press was joined by The Associated Press, The Washington Post and other organizations in a filing that supports Rolling Stone’s motion to override part of the jury’s Nov. 4 verdict in the high-profile case. In its own filing, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said it and eight other news organizations support Rolling Stone’s motion “with respect to the question of whether the editor’s note constituted a ‘republication’ of the entire article” and said they wish to assist the court in its determination of the case.
Richmond Times-Dispatch

A federal jury has convicted Norfolk Treasurer Anthony Burfoot of six out of eight felonies relating to public corruption and perjury.
Virginian-Pilot
Juror Laura Seitz was ready for a long deliberation. She had her opinions of Norfolk Treasurer Anthony Burfoot, but she wanted to talk over what she’d heard in the past five weeks with the other 11 people who would decide his fate. Just three hours in, however, it became clear that everyone was on the same page, she said. As they went over each of the public corruption and perjury counts, the jurors kept voting guilty. “Once we got a good process going, it all started to flow,” Seitz said. People kept asking whether anyone thought they were moving too fast, but the consensus was usually no. “We were prepared to deliberate for days, and we thought it would take days,” Seitz said. “But we didn’t need to.” In 5½ hours, the jury convicted Burfoot on four public corruption charges and two perjury charges. The city’s former vice mayor was acquitted on two other perjury charges. Seitz contacted The Virginian-Pilot on Saturday to walk through the jury’s deliberation process. She said Burfoot’s attorney complaining to the media Friday night that the jury didn’t take enough time prompted her to speak out.
Virginian-Pilot

Documents show Virginia prison officials have paid a compounding pharmacy $66,000 to obtain lethal injection drugs needed for two executions. The cost of carrying out death sentences in the state is rising dramatically under a law that allows prison officials to purchase lethal injections drugs from a compounding pharmacy the state refuses to name. The state is spending roughly 63 times last year’s going price for Virginia’s three-drug lethal injection package. The Associated Press obtained copies of receipts of the compounding pharmacy purchases under the Freedom of Information Act.
WVIR

National Stories
​

In the Shadows of Sunlight: The Effects of Transparency on State Political Campaigns
Liebert Publications

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press has been awarded a two-year grant totaling $450,000 from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation in support of RCFP’s work defending journalists’ legal rights in the face of increased threats to press freedom. The funding will go directly toward offering journalists and media organizations free legal resources to protect their First Amendment rights.
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press

Editorials/Columns


As venal politicians go, former Norfolk Vice Mayor Anthony Burfoot took a backseat to no one. Receive wads of cash? Yes. Take guests to someone else’s house, while pretending it was his own? Check. Demand appliances and home renovations? Sure, why not. Burfoot thought he was entitled – as many corrupt officials do. Always for sale. It was a terrible, unsophisticated betrayal of Norfolk residents, even when his vote on City Council didn’t change the outcome on many issues. Cynical, too.
Roger Chesley, Virginian-Pilot