N.C. Senate Official Confiscates Reporter’s Recorder

By: Andrew Beaujon | Poynter

The sergeant-at-arms office in the North Carolina Senate confiscated a reporter’s recorder after a senator requested any such devices “be approved,” Mark Binker reports for WRAL. Rosemary Hoban, a reporter for North Carolina Health News, was covering a committee meeting when she “noticed that her recorder, which she had placed on a side table, was missing,” Binker writes.

The senator, Rick Gunn, “could not cite a building rule or law that would have justified his announcement,” which Binker says violates the state’s open-meetings law. Gunn “walked away” when asked a follow-up question. Hoban “had to leave the meeting to retrieve her recorder,” Binker reports.