Snopes reports
Six journalists could spend up to 10 years in prison after being arrested during protests against President Donald Trump's inauguration.
The Guardian identified the journalists as freelancer Aaron CantĂș; Vocativ senior producer Evan Engel; Jack Keller, producer for the online documentary Story of America; independent journalists Matt Hopard and Shay Horse; and RT America reporter Alex Rubinstein.
The group was charged under a District of Columbia statute penalizing "every person who willfully incited or urged others to engage" in a riot causing more than $5,000 in property damage with the potential 10-year prison sentence and a fine of up to $25,000. More than 200 people in total were arrested the day of the 20 January 2017 inauguration; they were reportedly arraigned the following day and will be back in court in February and March.
[...] Another independent journalist and documentarian, Tim Pool, said on Twitter that he and two NBC News journalists were also arrested during the 20 January 2017 demonstrations but released without charges. Pool said that a supervising officer told him "no less than three times" that they were under arrest. NBC News has not responded to our request for comment regarding Pool's account.
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Friday January 27 2017, @06:29AM
Well, they do have a bit of property damage
Please cite for that bit, all I'm seeing is:
The linked articles in the story. One of them shows a burning vehicle.
So they aren't being charged with directly causing the property damage, they are just being put under the umbrella of "every person who willfully incited or urged others to engage" which is serious bullshit vaguery unless there is actual evidence.
I guess we'll have to see if there is evidence. I doubt the vehicle spontaneously caught on fire, but good chance that's on video. There seems to be a lot of video out there these days.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @03:44PM
I doubt the vehicle spontaneously caught on fire
Well, that kind of depends. Was it an American company's car? ;)
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"