ST. PAUL, MN (September 5, 2008) – After photojournalist Nathan Weber finally made bail and left jail Wednesday night after being arrested Monday while photographing anti-war demonstrators clashing with police, more journalists were detained or arrested Thursday night when policed rounded up more than 390 anti-war protesters shortly before Senator John McCain spoke to accept the Republican presidential nomination.
More than 1,000 protesters tried to march toward the convention hall but after several standoffs, police in riot gear used flash grenades and gas to herd the marchers onto the Marion Street bridge about one mile from the RNC site. "You are all under arrest," police told the crowd as they advanced on them.
"At some point even a journalist has to recognize that they are in violation of the law and they have to make a decision – are they going to get arrested or are they going to cover it from a distance?" St. Paul police spokesman Tom Walsh told a Reuters journalist at the scene.
Police used riot gear, snowplows, horses, and dump trucks to seal off downtown and to prevent marchers from reaching the RNC convention site, the Star Tribune says.
"They chose not to leave when told to do so, and now everyone's paying the price," a police officer at the scene said, the Star Tribune reports in this morning's news.
The group's permit to march and rally expired at 5 p.m. and after that, police began to try to contain them and move them away.
Two Associated Press reporters, KARE-11 photojournalist Jonathan Malat, Pioneer-Press photojournalist Ben Garvin, WCCO-TV photojournalist Tom Aviles, and about a dozen other journalists were detained, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune and the St. Paul Pioneer Press.
KARE11-TV has posted some of Malat's video from the incident, as well as an interview with him after he was released. Malat was the NPPA Ernie Crisp Television News Photographer of the Year in 1998 and again in 2002.
Also arrested, after he was gassed point-blank in the face, was the assistant picture editor for the Minnesota Daily, Stephen Maturen. The photographer tells a compelling first-person account of what happened to him while he was covering marchers who were near a Sears store.
The newspaper says they were issued citations and later released.
Earlier this week, NPPA president Bob Carey voiced NPPA's concerns to the St. Paul chief of police about the arrests of journalists. Carey sent St. Paul police chief John M. Harrington a letter and told Harrington, "We understand the need for police to arrest those persons involved in rioting or causing a public disturbance. Our specific concern is the manner in which law-abiding photojournalists, who were simply doing their job, were targeted by police officers."
"Photojournalists count on the fact that police presence at protests keeps them safe," Carey said. "It would be horrible for members of the media to conclude that police presence increases that risk factor. We deserve to be protected by police, not falsely arrested by them."
Photojournalists arrested earlier in the week are now all out of jail, but St. Paul police have not yet given back some photography equipment and personal gear that was confiscated when they were detained.
Weber, a Chicago-area freelancer and a graduate of Western Kentucky University's photojournalism program, made bail Wednesday night and arrived back in Chicago Friday morning, his family and girlfriend said, but police are holding his equipment until Monday. Weber will have to drive back to St. Paul to get his gear from the police.
While most of the photojournalists released were cited or not charged, Weber is still facing a Gross Misdemeanor Third Degree Rioting charge. If convicted, he could face up to 1 year in jail and a maximum fine of $3,000.
"I have a lawyer who works with the American Civil Liberties Union who will represent me," Weber told News Photographer magazine. Attorney Matthew Ludt of St. Paul will appear in court for Weber on September 30 and file a letter with the court asking the court for permission to represent Weber and appear on his behalf, so that Weber doesn't have to go back to St. Paul yet again.
"It's been a bit of a drag," Weber said today. "I went there knowing things could get intense. I've covered a handful of protests before, starting in 2002, mainly in the eastern United States, but St. Paul was definitely much more intense, it was a step up, largely because with the police there was zero tolerance."
Weber said that at other protests he's covered, if police saw you were media or saw a press card there was some leeway. "In St. Paul, it didn't matter. I think we [the media] were caught up in the mix and in the heat of the moment the police were not using much discretion."
The photojournalist said, "It's not hard to see who's media and who's not, even if you have two cameras, a tool belt, and a credential handing around your neck, it's pretty clear who's media and who's a protester."
Weber was shooting for the independent picture agency Trifecta Press Photo and was covering protesters near the Xcel Energy Center on Monday when, he says, police threw him to the ground, beat him, and then handcuffed and arrested him.
Associated Press photojournalist Matt Rourke, also arrested Monday while covering protesters, was released and will not be charged, according to AP.
Photojournalists from the University of Kentucky and their student advisor, who were also arrested Monday, are also free and apparently will not be charged. Student advisor Jim Winn and student photojournalists Ed Matthews and Britney McIntosh had been detained by St. Paul police. The felony rioting charges against them have been dropped "pending further investigation."
New York freelance photojournalist Jason Nicholas, who has shot for the New York Post previously but was covering protesters for Atlas Press at the RNC convention, was arrested by St. Paul police and may face more legal difficulties because of it. Nicholas, 37, is on parole after serving almost 13 years in prison for a manslaughter conviction, according to The New York Times, and this incident – combined with a recent dispute with New York City police at a news scene, where they confiscated his press credentials and cameras – could land him back in jail to serve the rest of his sentence.
Read earlier coverage of arrests
