Press freedom groups are raising alarm after New York police arrested and charged videographer Samuel Seligson for allegedly filming pro-Palestinian activists hurling red paint at the homes of top officials of the Brooklyn Museum, part of a campaign by activists demanding the institution divest from Israel. Seligson faces eight counts of criminal mischief with a hate crime enhancement, which is a felony. Police also raided his home twice. Seligson is a well-known local journalist whose work has appeared on major news outlets, and his attorney Leena Widdi says the charges are an attack on constitutionally protected press freedoms. “It is an extremely concerning assault on the First Amendment. The reason why the freedom of press is so strongly protected is because there’s some underlying belief that in order for the public to meaningfully participate in a democracy, they must be actually informed,” Widdi tells Democracy Now!
TRANSCRIPT
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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman.
Press freedom groups are raising alarm after New York police arrested a local journalist named Samuel Seligson and has charged him with eight counts of criminal mischief with a hate crime enhancement, which is a felony. Police also raided Seligson’s home twice over the past week. They’re accusing him of traveling with pro-Palestinian activists who hurled red paint at the homes of top officials of the Brooklyn Museum in June.
The Associated Press reports the complaint describes Seligson as a participant in the crime, but a law enforcement official told the AP he was not directly involved in the spray-painting or property damage. He is a video journalist who has contributed footage to many news outlets.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has criticized Seligson’s arrest. Katherine Jacobsen of CPJ said, “It’s really important for authorities in the broader public to understand and differentiate the difference between protesters and journalists,” quote. The Freedom of the Press Foundation warned Seligson’s arrest is an attempt to criminalize journalism.
On Thursday, I spoke to Samuel Seligson’s lawyer, Leena Widdi, and began by asking her to describe what actually happened.
LEENA WIDDI: My client, Samuel Seligson, is a 32-year-old independent videographer. He is being charged with eight counts of criminal mischief, as you said, with a hate crime enhancement. At this stage, it’s not clear that — the state has not provided any evidence that he was involved in property damage and that he was involved in any way beyond merely being present. If that is in fact the case, that is obviously consistent with his role as a journalist in documenting protest activities. And, in fact, as you said, the NYPD has made statements to the press that they do not — that they are not alleging him to have been involved in the property damage. So, it’s extremely concerning, shocking to me and to my client, that he’s being charged with not only felony criminal mischief, but a hate crime enhancement, and is —
AMY GOODMAN: And what does that mean, a hate crime enhancement?
LEENA WIDDI: A hate crime enhancement essentially means that the category of the crime, of the underlying crime for which you’re charged, is bumped up, so —
AMY GOODMAN: From misdemeanor to felony?
LEENA WIDDI: Well, in this case, the criminal mischief in the third degree is an E felony, so it’s bumped up to a D felony, which makes it one-bail eligible, and it increases the potential sentence for a person if they’re convicted, and is, of course, you know, I think, significant in the way the public views conduct, significant in the way that the court system deals with conduct, and is absolutely dangerous in terms of the precedent that it sets for any pro-Palestine protesters and journalists covering that protest. It necessarily perpetuates the narrative that any protest against the support for genocide is necessarily synonymous with protests against Jewishness. And my client himself is Jewish, as are many other anti-Zionist protesters.
AMY GOODMAN: His home was raided twice?
LEENA WIDDI: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: What does that mean?
LEENA WIDDI: That means the police went into his home on two separate occasions, attempted to arrest him, and on both occasions handcuffed his roommates and searched for him. And on the second occasion, we had already arranged a surrender with the NYPD, and he had planned — I had been in touch with the detective on the case, and he had planned to turn himself in. And yet a second raid was executed on his home.
AMY GOODMAN: So, he is — you’re arguing two things here. One is: Does the police have evidence that he was even at the homes of the Brooklyn Museum officials documenting what the activists were doing?
LEENA WIDDI: So, yes, in order for the state to prove this case against him, they would have to prove two things: one, that he was in fact — that he was in fact there — they would have to prove his identity — and, two, that if he were there, he participated in the criminal mischief beyond mere presence, because merely being present, whether you’re a journalist or not, is not enough to sustain criminal charges against you. So, that he was there, that he participated beyond mere presence, and that he participated with the intent to damage property, and, because of the hate crime enhancement, that he participated and was motivated, at least in part, by the identity of the people who own the homes, so by the race, national origin, sexual orientation of those people, which — and those are the protected classes that hate crimes legislation purportedly protects.
Now, we know that hate crimes legislation, like other laws, is used, in reality, to actually prosecute the most vulnerable and not to protect the most vulnerable. My client is an independent journalist. He’s Jewish himself. He’s being accused — along with the other five individuals, is being accused of a hate crime for, even if true, protesting the homes of executives of multimillion-dollar corporations who leverage extensive financial, cultural, political power and use that power in support of the genocide. And that is clearly what the protest is about. And it’s absurd that it is being portrayed as crimes against the — as hate crimes because of some tangential relationship that these people may have to a protected class, that my client is, in fact, part of. He is part of that protected class. He is Jewish.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, Samuel Seligson was previously arrested in May, is that right?
LEENA WIDDI: That’s —
AMY GOODMAN: Live-streaming a pro-Palestinian demonstration.
LEENA WIDDI: That’s correct, with his press credentials, live-streaming, thrown to the ground by police as people yelled, “He’s press! He’s press! He’s press!” And that case was not ultimately prosecuted by the District Attorney’s Office.
AMY GOODMAN: Right. A spokesperson for the Brooklyn DA said the case had been closed and sealed.
LEENA WIDDI: I’m not representing him on that case, but my understanding is that it hasn’t been — it hasn’t been prosecuted, that when he appeared for court, the District Attorney’s Office was not prepared and, you know, gave him a letter saying that he would be informed if they decided to prosecute the case.
AMY GOODMAN: Do you believe that the mayor is in any way involved in having him arrested? Of course, Mayor Adams is a former police officer himself.
LEENA WIDDI: You know, I can’t speculate on what his specific role is, but we do know that Mayor Adams has been a huge proponent of ramping up police at pro-Palestine protesters — at pro-Palestine protests, excuse me. He has signed off on millions of dollars in overtime for the NYPD, who we have seen use increasing violence against Palestine protesters. You know, we’re now 10 months into the genocide, and the violence at these protests continues. Meanwhile, Mayor Eric Adams is a huge proponent for cutting — for cutting public services, like the New York Public Library and 3-K.
And, you know, the hate crimes legislation is supposed to protect the most vulnerable people. It’s supposed to prevent race-based violence. And actually, where we’re seeing so much of that race-based violence in New York City is at these protests, committed by the NYPD against Black and Brown people, against Palestinians and against anti-Zionist Jews. And, you know, the city’s resources would be much better spent addressing that.
AMY GOODMAN: So, you’re Palestinian American. You’re a Palestinian American lawyer representing a Jewish journalist. If you can talk about how this fits into what you see as a broader crackdown on the pro-Palestinian protests? And particularly start by addressing groups like the Committee to Protect Journalists and the press freedom groups that are standing up for Samuel.
LEENA WIDDI: Yes. So, it’s wonderful to see all of these press groups standing up for Samuel, speaking out against the assault on journalists. And this is an assault on journalists that is happening worldwide. We are now 306 days into the genocide, and over a hundred journalists, as you know well, have been massacred, and many more detained by Israel.
This is an attempt to — it is an extremely concerning assault on the First Amendment. The reason why the freedom of press is so strongly protected is because there’s some underlying belief that in order for the public to meaningfully participate in a democracy, they must be actually informed. And criminalizing the press, manufacturing risk that they will be prosecuted if they cover protests, is extremely chilling behavior, and everyone should be speaking up about it. Everyone should be concerned. Everyone should be identifying this as a political decision and not a legal one.
It is political to charge a journalist with a crime while he is — you know, again, if he is proven to be there, and if there is no evidence that he engaged in any of the underlying property damage, that he was just doing his job. And it’s extremely concerning that he’s being charged, and even more concerning that he’s being charged with a hate crime.
And it’s concerning that all of these — all of these people are being prosecuted for hate crimes, because it is an absolute misuse of the hate crimes legislation and, again, an exploitation of the law — which is not new, unfortunately, in this country, as we all know very well — an exploitation of the law to prosecute the most vulnerable in favor of the most powerful. And in this case, it’s very stark.
AMY GOODMAN: Leena Widdi is attorney for Samuel Seligson, a New York City-based journalist charged with felony hate crime for allegedly filming pro-Palestinian activists hurling red paint at the homes of top officials at the Brooklyn Museum. Seligson’s work has appeared in Reuters, Al Jazeera, ABC and Fox News.
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Democracy Now! is produced with Renée Feltz, Mike Burke. I’m Amy Goodman. Thanks so much for joining us for another edition of Democracy Now!