ROANOKE, Va. (CN) — A federal judge refused to let Virginia’s court administration escape a lawsuit by Courthouse News and Lee Enterprises that says Virginia officials are imposing a prior restraint on speech.
“I thereby find that the plaintiffs have made a plausible showing that the Dissemination Restriction is a prior restraint that would not survive strict scrutiny,” wrote Judge James P. Jones in a 16-page order.
The lawsuit is the third in a yearslong struggle between this news service and Virginia’s court bureaucracy which works in the thrall of local elected clerks who, like many local clerks around the country, rely on court records as a source of income.
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