Kansas newspaper files lawsuit over police raids

A weekly central Kansas newspaper and its publisher filed a federal lawsuit Monday over police raids last summer of its offices and the publisher’s home, accusing local officials of trying to silence the paper and causing the death of the publisher’s 98-year-old mother.

The lawsuit did not include a specific figure for potential damages. However, in a separate notice to local officials, the paper and its publisher said they believe they are due more than $10 million.

The raids put Marion, a town of about 1,900 people set among rolling prairie hills about 150 miles southwest of Kansas City, Missouri, at the center of a national debate over press freedoms.