"all documents related to articles and other content published by Phoenix New Times newspaper in print and on the Phoenix New Times website, regarding Sheriff Joe Arpaio from January 1, 2004 to the present."
That includes, according to the paper:
Every note, tape, and record from every story written about Sheriff Arpaio by every reporter over a period of years.
But, the subpoena also wants:
.... detailed information on anyone who has looked at the New Times Web site since 2004. Every individual who looked at any story, review, listing, classified, or retail ad over a period of years.
Here's the exact subpoena language:
"All internet web site information for the Phoenix New Times internet site related to the web pages . . . [four specific articles on the sheriff]. The information should include, but not be limited to: The Internet Protocol addresses of any and all visitors to each page of . . . [four specific articles on the sheriff]. . ."
...."Any and all documents containing a compilation of aggregate information about the Phoenix New Times Web site created or prepared from January 1, 2004 to the present, including but not limited to:
A) which pages visitors access or visit on the Phoenix New Times website;
B) the total number of visitors to the Phoenix New Times website;
C) information obtained from 'cookies,' including, but not limited to, authentication, tracking, and maintaining specific information about users (site preferences, contents of electronic shopping carts, etc.);
D) the Internet Protocol address of anyone that accesses the Phoenix New Times website from January 1, 2004 to the present;
E) the domain name of anyone that has accessed the Phoenix New Times website from January 1, 2004 to the present;
F) the website a user visited prior to coming to the Phoenix New Times website;
G) the date and time of a visit by a user to the Phoenix New Times website;
H) the type of browser used by each visitor (Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Netscape Navigator, Firefox, etc.) to the Phoenix New Times website; and
I) the type of operating system used by each visitor to the Phoenix New Times website."
What is Arapio so riled up about?
The seemingly picayune matter of Sheriff Arpaio's home address getting printed at the bottom of an opinion column on our Internet site — and the very real issue of commercial property investments the sheriff hid from public view — have now erupted into a courtroom donnybrook against a backdrop of illegal immigration disputes, Mexican drug cartels, the Minutemen, political ambition, and turf disputes between prosecutors and the judiciary.
The paper will resist:
A grand jury investigation is a fearsome thing; a tainted grand jury is a tipping point.
We intend now to break the silence and resist.
A motion to quash the subpoenas is pending, as is a motion to remove the special prosecutor.
The paper alleges the special prosecutor improperly contacted the judge.
Special prosecutor Dennis Wilenchik argued in his paperwork that if we didn't like the intrusiveness of the subpoenas, we had choices within the system.
When Dennis Wilenchik surreptitiously contacted the judge presiding over our grand jury, he argued that we should not be alarmed.
"If there is prosecutorial misconduct in the proceedings, petitioners have remedies for that. Just ask Mike Nifong, the Duke [University] lacrosse players' prosecutor," wrote Wilenchik in his response to our motion to remove him from the case.
That's our remedy? Look to Duke? Look to the case where the defendants' lives were ruined, jobs lost, educations canceled, fortunes squandered on attorneys, reputations smeared, and the landscape scorched with the due process of the law?
There's more recent news in the case, including the arrest of the paper's editor and CEO last night.
New Times founders, Village Voice Media Executive Editor Michael Lacey and Chairman/CEO Jim Larkin at their homes late Thursday evening for revealing grand jury information in their recent story Grand Jury Targets New Times and Its Readers.
They bonded out around 4 a.m. today.
Unbowed and surprisingly lucid for a man who's just spent the night in jail, Lacey spoke with a gaggle of reporters including yours truly and Channel 3's Mike Watkiss. The journalist and alt-newspaper titan, who along with Larkin founded New Times in 1970 as a reaction to the war in Vietnam, vowed to continue the fight against abuses of power by County Attorney Andy Thomas, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, and Thomas' paid attack hound, lawyer Dennis Wilenchik.
"We're going to keep publishing, and with God's help, we're going to keep printing," he declared. Lacey explained the background of his arrest, and how special prosecutor Dennis Wilenchik had attempted ex parte communications with the judge overseeing a grand jury investigation of Phoenix New Times. The investigation stems from the paper publishing Sheriff Arpaio's home address online three years ago in reporter John Dougherty's column. Lacey stated that Wilenchik's brazen attempt to influence the judge in this case forced New Times' hand, resulting in Thursday's revelation of the broad grand jury subpoena.
Stay tuned.