Some good news for journalists in Nevada, via FourthAmendment.com. A decision made earlier this year by a state court has been reversed, resulting in an expansion of the protections offered by the state’s journalist shield law. In March, Judge James Wilson — overseeing a defamation lawsuit filed by Storey County Commissioner Lance Gilman against blogger Sam Toll — decided the journalist shield law only protects journalists who work for printed newspapers. While it acknowledged the 1969 law also covers television journalists, it refused to extend these protections to Sam Toll and his blog, the Storey Teller. Toll was actually a member of the Nevada Press Association at the time he was sued, but Judge Wilson said that didn’t matter because the alleged defamation occurred before he received these credentials. Wilson ordered Toll to divulge his sources. Toll challenged this decision, resulting in the state’s Supreme Court letting the lower court know it can’t define “journalism” so narrowly. The decision says the court needs to buy a few more dictionaries. The definition of “print” the lower court used isn’t the only one available.
— source techdirt.com | Dec 13th 2019