I have a new hero. His name is John Daniel Garcia.
John
Garcia is a reporter for the Big Bend Sentinel here in Texas. After corresponding
with and reporting on an allusive artist who graffitied a strange shack in the
wilderness, for some reason called “art” here in Texas, he was subpoenaed to
turn over his notes under threat of jail. The authorities, who claimed they had
a “felony” on their hands, could not find the
identity of the culprit and wanted the phone number from John’s notes.
The
story received no coverage in my area (Texas is a big place, folks) but the
story was topic #1 on my journalism feeds and I began following it online.
John
and his fine newspaper stood up against the badges and he did not go to jail for
it.
But before I give you a brief on the details, I want all reporters and
journalists to raise a favorite beverage and toast John Garcia. Not only did he
stand up the rights of reporters, salute him for being a kickass reporter. I also
believe it must have been a troublesome period for John. So John, we salute
you!
One of John's cool Facebook pics |
OK,
here is the brief. There are many international readers of Ninja Journalism, so
you locals bear with me on some of the explanations.
Outside
the East Texas town of Marfa, a county seat with a population a little over
20,000, a group of artists built an empty store-like building in 2005 on the
side of the road in the middle of nowhere. They called it Prada Marfa and they
called it “art,” and the county embraced it (fell for it).
This
year someone known only as 9271977 graffitied the
heck out of the building. While authorities were scratching their heads, Garcia used his reporter brain and discovered the identity of the doer and corresponded
with him for a fantastic story.
The Authorities came down on John for his notes to obtain the
person's phone number, claiming they were not violating any aspect of the First
Article of the U.S. Constitution. Granted, the First Amendment is a dozy to
understand (read an earlier post on it here), but beyond the whole “freedom of
the press” thing, Texas is one of 37 states in the U.S. that has a law
protecting reporters and their information. John and his newspaper did not give
in, and in time authorities discovered the deed-doer to be talented
artist Joe Magnano. Joe got arrested and the heat was turned
down on John and as of this post, Magnano’s day in court has yet to come. I guess he
might get fined for putting bad art on worse art or something.
The end.
I now toast John Garcia with a Shiner Black Lager.
Here is a link to the story of John getting subpoenaed .
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Marfa Prada |