Trial delayed until September

Hey y’all! Some updates for you:

The “felony littering” trial is now continued until September, because the APD messed up the evidence so entirely that it took the full two weeks the trial was predicted to last just to properly testify to all their “negligence” and “inexperience.” Here’s a very through article about that negligence and inexperience, from Ryan Oehrli in the Citizen Times: Attorney: Asheville Police “negligence,” “inexperience” cause felony littering trial delay. Still unknown is whether the prosecution will face sanctions for the series of egregious discovery violations that resulted from the APD’s gross mishandling of evidence. Whatever comes of that, the state’s determination to prosecute this protest is coming at a huge and ongoing cost of public resources.

The Blade journalist’s jury trial to appeal their trespassing convictions is now set for June 12. See Leftist Asheville reporters convicted of trespassing have date set for new trial.

And the best for last: John Cusack is out here sticking up for press freedoms!! Yay John Cusack. See Joel Burgess in the Asheville Citizen Times: Actor John Cusack, dozens of media orgs protest Asheville reporters criminal convictions. Here’s the actual letter from Cusack and all those orgs. The article also includes the recent revelation that the Asheville Police Department did even more illegal things, this time getting a warrant for one reporter’s phone; details on the illegality of that below:

That’s it for now friends. While the trial is delayed we’re planning to keep you updated every couple of weeks or so no matter what, and more often as there are developments in our lawsuit with the ACLU to change the City’s unconstitutional park ban policy, and/or the Blade trial, and/or John Cusack. Parks are for Everyone!