Some examples of justice systems at work
Roberta Alcantar, a Palmdale resident, whose teenage son was fatally struck by a ricocheting bullet when deputies fired at a dog that had attacked one of them, has reached a tentative settlement in her lawsuit against Los Angeles County, court papers show.
She filed the lawsuit in December 2017, in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleging wrongful death and assault and battery and seeking unspecified damages.
Attorneys for Los Angeles County contended in their court papers, that deputies fired at the dog in self defense in the pre-dawn hours of June 22, 2017, and that they did not see 17-year-old Armando Garcia standing nearby.
The attorneys also stated that a sheriff ’s sergeant promptly sought medical aid for the teen.
According to the mother’s lawsuit, the teen tried to restrain the dog, which did not belong to
him or any of the friends with him that day.
In April, a freelance photographer’s home was the target of San Francisco police officers, who arrived with guns drawn and carrying a search warrant, a sledgehammer and a battering ram.
In an interview on May 13, as concern spread among journalists and civil rights activists about his treatment, Bryan Carmody said his wrists were still sore from being handcuffed for six hours while the police raided his house and seized laptops, phones and hard drives — including all the images and documents he had archived from his 29-year career as a reporter and cameraman.
The case stems from the February death of Jeff Adachi, the city’s public defender, who was beloved by San Francisco’s liberal elites, but who had a contentious relationship with the Police Department.
An autopsy released a month after his death, revealed that it was caused by a mixture of cocaine, alcohol and a weakened heart.
“The seizure and search of (Carmody’s) home and office were totally inappropriate and out of bounds,” Matt Drange, the co-chair of the freedom of information committee of the Northern California chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists said. “Publishing a leaked document is not breaking the law.”
Earlier this month, two prize winning Reuters journalists were released from prison in Myanmar, after more than a year in detention for covering the country’s deadly crackdown on the Rohingya minority group.
The two reporters, 33-year-old U Wa Lone and U Kyaw Soe Oo, were arrested in December 2017.
They were sentenced to seven years in prison under the colonial-era Official Secrets Act for receiving documents from a police officer as part of their investigation into a 2017 massacre of 10 Tohingya villagers.
In April, the men, along with their Reuters colleagues, were awarded the Pulitzer Prize for international reporting, one of journalism’s most coveted and prestigious honors.
On May 6, they were mobbed by reporters as they emerged from Insein Prison in Yangon, the country’s largest city. They were both smiling as they walked away from the prison’s gates, in the sunshine. Wa Lone flashed a thumbs-up sign.
“I’m really happy and excited to see my family and my colleagues,” he told reporters. “I can’t wait to go to my newsroom.”
In a statement, Stephen Adler, the editor in chief of Reuters, praised the men as courageous reporters.
“Since their arrest 511 days ago, they have been symbols of the importance of press freedom around the world,” he said. “We welcome their return.”
The two reporters were released as part of a wider presidential pardon that freed more than 6,000 prisoners.
Their case had become an international cause celebre, with journalists, human rights activists and world leaders calling for their release.