At the Hutchinson Public Library’s June board meeting last year, the room was packed with people, a few protesting a book display in the children’s area for Pride Month, and many others supporting it. This year, things were back to normal. Gregg Wamsley, Hutchinson Public Library director
HPD showcases motorcycle unit Drivers around Hutchinson may see a new police unit riding around that’s not in a traditional patrol vehicle. Officer Jarod Gilmore with the Hutchinson Police Department has been riding motorcycles for recreation since 2016. Gilmore attended motorcycle certification with the Wichita Police Department
At around 7:46 p.m., the Reno County Sheriff’s Office responded to an attempted first-degree murder in rural Reno County Saturday, June 29.
Sheriff Darrian Campbell said Douglas Hall and his daughter were working in a field when the daughter got the truck stuck in a ditch. Thomas Morrison identified the vehicle and directly fired upon Hall and his daughter with a .22 caliber revolver. Morrison also fired two shots from a long rifle.
“Mr. Hall was able to remove the vehicle to the ditch and contacted 911,” Campbell said. “Mr. Morrison was taken into custody for those charges.”
Morrison was taken into custody for attempted first-degree homicide, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and aggravated child endangerment. This is an isolated incident and is still under investigation.
During the investigation, it was discovered Hall and Morrision knew one another and did not get along.
This is an isolated incident and is still under investigation. All subjects are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
At around 7:46 p.m., the Reno County Sheriff’s Office responded to an attempted first-degree murder in rural Reno County Saturday, June 29. Sheriff Darrian Campbell said Douglas Hall and his daughter were working in a field when the daughter got the truck stuck in a ditch.
The Stripes defeated the Stars 9-2 Sunday night at the Jayhawk Collegiate League All-Star Game at Riverfront Stadium in Wichita. The Stripes banged out 12 hits and committed no errors. The Stars had six hits and one error. The Stripes team included head coach Casey Lippoldt as
Fireworks sales were brisk Monday morning in Hutchinson as nine vendors marketed their products in the same number of locations. At a mid-morning stop in the parking lot of Dillons Marketplace, a two-person crew was overseeing what seemed like a hundred or more fireworks options with
Hutchinson’s YMCA, located at 716 East 13th Avenue, is “bursting at the seams,” according to David Foster, the organization’s branch director, and is slated for replacement by 2026. In a Monday noon speech to the Hutchinson Rotary Club meeting held at the Hutchinson Community College, Foster said
This weekend, Gina, John and I attended the Kansas Press Association’s annual convention in Lawrence.
This was the first time we were able to mingle and meet with other state publishers, ranging in size from the Wichita Eagle to the smallest weekly papers in the state.
The first thing I noticed was pretty apparent: I was, by far, the youngest person at the convention. Besides the collegiate papers which were represented (ESU Bulletin, Eudora Times with KU) I had a good 20 years as the youngest person.
Throughout the convention, we discussed many issues impacting both print and digital journalism, but one stood out to me in particular. As I’m sure we all remember, the Marion County Record was raided in August 2023. Publisher Eric Meyer was at the convention, and there was an entire session dedicated to how we as news sources learn from the severe illegal actions that took place only an hour away.
But with Meyer’s persistence in keeping and publishing the paper through the investigation, it shows that we all have a duty to support local journalism.
The freedom of the press is an essential component of who we are as a country. It was the very first thing mentioned in the U.S. Constitution’s Bill of Rights. To say the least, it’s pretty important.
And from the first minute I was at the convention, I could tell everyone there felt the same.
Local publishers and editors do their jobs because they love it and support the mission of the press. They certainly aren’t in it for the money (I can attest to that) or for the fame, but because they believe they have a cause to support their communities and hold their government institutions accountable.
At the convention, we discussed the Freedom of Information Act and the Kansas Open Records/Meetings Act. These are laws that require nearly all government meetings to be open to the public and ensure government records of all sorts are accessible.
But recently, FOIA and KORA requests have been declining in success. At the state level, KORA requests are successful roughly 31% of the time. On the federal level, it’s even worse: 13%.
13%! Could you imagine if you answered your mother only 13% of the time?
It’s our job as newspapers to hold government institutions accountable, and we need your help as readers to do so. Becoming a paid subscriber is the best way to support local journalism in any area.
Overall, the press convention was eye-opening and inspiring for both Gina and me to continue our work as journalists and support our community. I hope to continue playing a small part in building our community and making Hutchinson a better place.
Michael Glenn is the publisher of The Hutchinson Tribune and can be reached at mglenn@hutchtribune.com
This weekend, Gina, John and I attended the Kansas Press Association’s annual convention in Lawrence. This was the first time we were able to mingle and meet with other state publishers, ranging in size from the Wichita Eagle to the smallest weekly papers in the state. The
What happened at the Marion County Record newspaper 10 months ago on Aug. 11, 2023, was not a raid.
The Kansas Reflector referred to it as a “takedown” in its April 1, 2024, edition.
However, In my opinion, it was a “police assault,” by some bad people disguised as law enforcement officers.
It was a “search and seizure.”
The term “raid” is a convenient shortcut term to thinking on what really happened. Many people in the media used it. Myself included.
The Marion County Record police assault was the main subject of a forum at the Kansas Press Association’s annual meeting Friday morning at the Oread Hotel near the University of Kansas campus in Lawrence.
“Does the Kansas Shield Law (protecting journalists and the 1st Amendment) work?,” was a question put to KPA members in the Oread Hotel Sunflower Ballroom by panelist Stephen Wolgast from the University of Kansas.
“Ask Eric Meyer,” Wolgast said.
Meyer, editor and publisher of the Marion County Record, was in attendance at the KPA meetings.
The Marion County Record captured several awards in several news categories. The newspaper overcame numerous obstacles to publishing the paper for the days immediately following the assault because their equipment and phones were seized.
“Seized!” was the main headline of the Marion County Record the day after the assault. The subhead read “but not silenced.”
Meyer said we should remember two words: “Qualified immunity.” There are several lawsuits pending in Marion County.
“There has to be some degree of responsibility from public officials,” Meyer said.
The KPA released the results of one-hour interviews with 19 Kansas reporters, editors and publishers from a joint effort by the University of Kansas (Wolgast) and University of Missouri (Nick Mathews) to gauge their reactions to the assault on the Marion County Record.
Wolgast, a Knight Chair in Audience and Community Engagement for News and professor of the practice of journalism at the William Allen White School of Journalist at the University of Kansas, and Mathews, assistant professor in the School of Journalism at the University of Missouri, composed the summary from the 19 journalists’ reactions to the assault on the Marion County Record search and seizure.
The journalists were interviewed for the Zoom social media platform in January and February by research assistant Deborah Dwyer Ph.D. The journalists received $100 gift cards and were granted anonymity to speak freely.
Shock, disbelief, anger, disgust, righteous indignation and fear were the most common emotional responses from the 19 journalists as came out through their interviews.
Many of them were surprised that an assault, search and seizure like what happened with the Marion County Record could happen in a state like Kansas.
“There’s a sense that if they (law enforcement and officials from local and state government officials and even the federal government) can get away with some of this, it will be open season on all of us (journalists),” said the surveyed journalists.
Participants commonly said they had made no changes in their news practices as a result of the raid.
“Everybody was really coming together and really seemed to understand … the situation and why it was so scary and why it was so important for us.”
Several participants were unaware of the Kansas Shield Law. Also many had not additional information on legal protections such as the Privacy Protection Act.
The federal Privacy Protection Act of 1980 protects journalists and newsrooms from most searches by law enforcement, requiring police usually to issue subpoenas rather than search warrants.
The Federal PPA came about when Congress – with prompting from then-President Jimmy Carter – reacted to the 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case Zurcher v. Stanford Daily, involving a police search of the Stanford University student newspaper.
According to the Freedom Forum, the Stanford Daily lost its challenge to the search, but Carter warned the decision threatened the “effective functioning of our free press,” and that the nation needed “new, stringent safeguards against federal, state and local governmental intrusion into First Amendment activities.”
A few of the 19 journalists who participated in the reaction interviews mentioned they had legal training through their journalism experiences or the KPA.
“I had no idea we had a shield law until Marion happened,” some of the journalists said.
Because of what happened with the Marion Record with their computers and phones being seized, some of the journalists said it as more important than ever for newspapers and journalists to have their files backed up — even off-site.
“In a newsroom that has no off-site backups, if the police raided us and took our equipment, we’d be kind of screwed.”
Like many journalists now, I work from home. Reporters from home use desktop computers, laptop computers and their phones. If police can “raid” a newsroom, they can raid a home. The bedroom and kitchen table can be “raided.” My home is my newsroom.
“So if my newsroom gets raided, it basically means my house is getting raided — and if my work phone is taken, that’s the same. That’s my personal phone,” said the journalists.
Participants in the KPA interviews said they saw no change in their relationships with local leaders. Some said that local leaders were trying to be more transparent with them.
“As we always say in the small towns, we can report on these people,” said the journalists. “Sure enough, we are going to run into them the next day or the next week on the street.”
For the record, I know one of the reporters at the Marion County Record who was a central figure in the assault — Phyllis Zorn.
She worked at the Enid News & Eagle as a reporter while I was a copy editor there. She also worked at newspapers in Kingman and Hays.
Zorn is seeking $950,000 in damages from the city of Marion, its former mayor, its former police chief, its current interim police chief, the Marion County Commission, the county sheriff and a former sheriff’s deputy.
According to an Associated Press article written by John Hanna from Feb. 11, 2024, Zorn’s lawsuit called them “co-conspirators” who deprived her of press and speech freedoms and the protection from unreasonable police searches guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.
Hanna’s article said he lawsuit alleges Cody was “infuriated” that the newspaper was investigating his background before he became Marion’s chief in May 2023. It also said Zorn was on Cody’s “enemies list.”
Zorn’s federal lawsuit is the second by a Marion County Record journalist over the assault.
Former Record reporter Deb Gruver sued Cody less than three weeks after the raid, seeking more than $75,000 in actual damages and more than $75,000 in punitive damages.
The Kansas Bureau of Investigation took over the investigation of newspaper, but turned the case over to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
The Kansas Reflector reported that the KBI had been involved in investigating the journalists and knew police were planning to raid the newspaper office.
The CBI said it would look into the civil rights issues. Their findings have not been made public.
There are several other lawsuits pending, including a wrongful death suit. Eric Meyer’s 98-year-old mother died the day after the assault from cardiac arrest caused by the trauma of having the police search the home where she and Eric lived.
Marion County Record office manager Cheri Bentz field a separate lawsuit because the search and seizure.
According to Kansas Reflector in its April 1, 2024, edition, the Marion County Record has filed a federal First Amendment lawsuit against local authorities who planned and carried out the raid last year of the newspaper office and publishers’ home, accusing the “co-conspirators” of seeking revenge for unfavorable news coverage through falsified and invalid search warrants.
According to a 127-page complaint, former Mayor David Mayfield ordered the takedown of the newspaper and a political rival after identifying journalists as “the real villains in America.”
The lawsuit claims defendants violated the First Amendment freedom of the press, the Fourth Amendment prohibition on warrantless searches, and federal and state laws that protect journalists — and their sources — from police raids.
Mayfield, former Marion police Chief Gideon Cody, acting police Chief Zach Hudlin, Marion County Sheriff Jeff Soyez and sheriff’s Detective Aaron Christner are defendants in the lawsuit, personally and in their official capacity.
The city council and county commission also are defendants.
John Mesh has worked in journalism for nearly 40 years in Missouri, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Kansas. He currently freelance reports for The Hutchinson Tribune.
What happened at the Marion County Record newspaper 10 months ago on Aug. 11, 2023, was not a raid. The Kansas Reflector referred to it as a “takedown” in its April 1, 2024, edition. However, In my opinion, it was a “police assault,” by some bad people
I love Hutchinson’s cultural scene, from the top-notch community theater to the Hutchinson Art Center and public art to street festivals, chocolate crawls, parades and proclamations.
My favorite week is always Smallville Festival week.
From its humble 2013 beginnings to the full-fledged three-day community-wide blur of events and activities for all ages, the Smallville Festival began as a proclamation signed by the mayor to rename the city “Smallville” after the fictional hometown of Clark Kent. The three-day celebration begins on June’s third Thursday and continues through the following Saturday.
In the Superman comics, Smallville’s influence shaped the superhero’s moral core. In Hutchinson, the event features one of the largest Third Thursday celebrations downtown, with food, cosplay and costume contests. Michael was asked to portray Clark Kent and he got to work figuring out the look and tracking down the blue undershirt with the famous “S” logo.
Friday brought daylong events downtown, culminating in a street party presented by Salt City Brewery and featuring local recording artist Logan Mize. The Hutchinson Zoo held Zooper Family Night, a family-oriented educational activity.
Saturday was even busier. Beginning at 8 a.m., a 5k race 650 ft underground at Strataca was held. The Cosmosphere hosted its first Amazing Space Race, an exciting opportunity to learn while solving clues throughout the building. A Downtown Hutch scavenger hunt explored the similarities between Hutchinson and Smallville.
The inaugural Hutch Comic Con filled the Meadowlark Building on the Kansas State Fairgrounds from 10 a.m. – 6 p.m., followed by the Smallville Fair, Food & Tunes, offering food, drinks, $4 Ye Old Mill rides, and a showing of the “Justice League” movie.
Juneteenth observances continued on Friday with a blood drive and on Saturday with brunch and a hair show.
The Family Community Theatre held an amazing production of “12 Angry Jurors.” The Fox Theatre screened the classic film “Imitation of Life” on Thursday and Saturday.
Smallville may be fictional, but the spirit is not. The festival showcases the downtown’s vibrancy, allows everyone to enjoy and celebrate as they wish, and leaves a large economic footprint.
This week has been busy with activities, and we have scrambled to cover as many as possible. Now, the Smallville Tribune returns to its humble Hutchinson roots, and we move on, but the essence of Smallville lingers.
I love Hutchinson’s cultural scene, from the top-notch community theater to the Hutchinson Art Center and public art to street festivals, chocolate crawls, parades and proclamations. My favorite week is always Smallville Festival week. From its humble 2013 beginnings to the full-fledged three-day community-wide blur of events
According to the Great Bend Bats Cats baseball team’s social media pages, their clubhouse was broken into Thursday night. The Bat Cats are a member of the Jayhawk Collegiate League along with the Hutchinson Monarchs. The crime has been reported to law enforcement, but the Bat Cats
