Boston Phoenix Publisher Stephen Mindich faces a June 4 contempt hearing for his refusal to turn over his e-mails in a case involving his wife, Superior Court Judge Maria I. Lopez, the Boston Herald reports. A Massachusettes judicial commission investigating Lopez' handling of an attempted rape case issued the subpoena for Mindich's e-mails. Mindich's lawyer, Harvey Silvergate, says he has advised his client not to comply with the subpoena. ``When a court order is unconstitutional, one has a right to appeal it to the U.S. Supreme Court,'' Silvergate tells the Herald.
After 24 years with East Bay Express, Editor John Raeside is hanging it up. Raeside has announced his resignation, effective March 1. Managing Editor Stephen Buel will take his place. Raeside says the paper has had some remarkable accomplishments in its first year under New Times ownership and that he feels he's leaving it in good hands.
In what he calls his final duty as editor of In Pittsburgh, Stephen Segal says farewell to readers in a column published by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "I still can't get over how lucky, how tremendously privileged I've been to be part of the team" at In Pittsburgh, he writes. The paper was sold last week to cross-town rival Pittsburgh City Paper.
A court has ordered Mindich to release his private emails concerning a rape case in which his wife Maria Lopez was judge. Friends and family of the victim say the sentence Lopez gave the defendant was too lenient and claim Mindich’s emails are part of a “whisper campaign” to discredit the victim. Mindich says the content of the emails is irrelevant and that he’s ready to go to the Supreme Court if necessary to prove his private correspondence is private.
