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A Maricopa County Superior Court judge yesterday unsealed the grand jury records of the county's investigation of the alt-weekly, which was dropped last Friday. "Not a shred of evidence was ever presented to a single juror, and not a charge was filed," according to the Arizona Republic. The transcripts mirror the story laid out by New Times last week, but there was at least one new detail: After an Oct. 11 hearing, special prosecutor Dennis Wilenchik and New Times reporter Paul Rubin nearly came to blows during a recess. New Times also reports the documents show the county made payments of nearly $2 million to Wilenchik's firm for handling the case. In another story, Wilenchik tells the Republic that while he didn't personally order the arrest of Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin, he had no regrets about it. "They deserved to be arrested," he says. "I don't have a problem with their arrest."

Continue ReadingPhoenix New Times Case Files Unsealed

In a letter to readers in the special issue hitting the streets of Richmond, Va., today, publisher Lori Collier Waran and editor Jason Roop take stock of their successes and look back at the optimism with which Style launched in November 1982. "It's difficult to imagine such optimism today, considering the publishing landscape," they write. "But here we are, hundreds of stories, thousands of pages and millions of words later, celebrating a milestone. Thank you for reading us and supporting us with your advertising."

Continue ReadingStyle Weekly Launches 25th Anniversary Issue

A few weeks back, we noted that the San Francisco Bay Guardian had joined a number of Bay Area groups in the investigative project to continue the slain journalist's work. But there was one glaring omission from the list of participating organizations: The East Bay Express, which five years ago investigated the group Bailey was writing about and whose staffers suffered death threats because of it, was not included. "It's definitely odd that the one newspaper that owned the story of Your Black Muslim Bakery wasn't invited to participate in this project until after it was formally announced," Express editor Stephen Buel tells SF Weekly. Buel says he'd heard that one of the news outlets in the Bailey Project had a beef with his paper, but that a project organizer recently assured him that it was not an intentional snub and invited the Express to participate. The paper has declined the belated invitation, and will continue to pursue the story on its own.

Continue ReadingWhy Isn’t the East Bay Express Part of the Chauncey Bailey Project?

To show solidarity with Phoenix New Times, members of AAN are providing links on their websites that direct their readers to the many places on the internet where the home address of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is listed. Last week, New Times disclosed that its executives, writers, and even its readers were the target of a sweeping grand jury probe relating to the paper's publishing the sheriff's home address online; this disclosure led to the paper's co-founders being arrested. One day later, all charges against New Times were dropped. "Our association and its members won't tolerate this sort of attack on the right of a member paper to publish information that is and ought to be public record," says Tim Redmond, AAN First Amendment Chair Tim Redmond and executive editor of the San Francisco Bay Guardian.

Continue ReadingAlt-Weeklies Protest Arizona Officials’ Outrageous Abuse of Power