Reply #182: Thanks,,,and

[Bushies gotta go]

I fully understand "freedom of information" and your ability to later obtain police reports. I also fully understand the rightt to take photographs.

But I will ask you... can you walk right up to where the police are dealing with a situation and begin to eavesdrop or even ask questions? No. That would be interfering. You said it yourself... "as long as I don't get in their way". And being a reporter, you surely recognize that "in the way" has no specific distance that may be kept, every situation differs.

There's a big difference between getting your reporting done by picking up a copy of the offense report later and barging into the middle of a police situation. There's also a big difference between (perhaps) your job where you might be known to the local cops versus some guy out of the blue walking up on a situation with a camera and refusing to do what the officers instruct him to do. Did the OP in this case even have credentials? Were they displayed? Did he tell them he was freelancing for a "dot com" (which could be construed as something like YouTube)?

Like I say, we have one side of the story.