Journalist Jailed due to Protecting her Whistleblowers

On the morning of April 10, 2021, Carmen Martinez, an investigative journalist working for the oldest newspaper in the capital of South Dakota, The Dakotan, received an anonymous tip exposing ten government officials with committing fraud and transferring federal funds meant for education and youth wellness purposes into their personal accounts. Starting from June 10, 2022 she published a series of articles entitled “Politicians are Getting Rich by Leaving Our Children Behind”. By the third article, her work gained national attention. Despite facing coercion and threats, she protected her confidential sources. The evident violations exposed by Martinez resulted in the start of a federal investigation, with the state officials involved. On August 1, 2022, the federal government subpoenaed Martinez to testify before a grand jury and disclose her sources, arguing that the information was crucial to their investigation. When she was subpoenaed to testify and reveal her whistleblowers, Martinez refused, and postulated her First Amendment rights. She was arrested later that month.

The defendant of Maria Hernandez, Theodora Dwek,  stated that “if they were to force Hernandes to reveal her sources, it would kind of be like using her as a private investigator, though that is not her job, and…cause for a lot of people to not want to give up that kind of information which could be vital for cases like this.” 

 Even though the District Court ruled in Martinez’s favor, underlining the importance of protecting news-reporting confidentiality for the freedom of the press, the government argued that divulging the sources was vital for their investigation. The Plaintiff for the United States, Carmen Gonzalez, stated that “ In the South Dakota government, there is a lot of corruption and  that obviously comes with its costs. So, funding that would go to educational and youth wellness purposes usually is being taken for personal gains by people in the government. So…by not compelling Martinez to reveal her sources, this is just like allowing the corruption to grow.”

The Supreme Court is now tasked with determining whether Carmen Martinez is required to reveal her whistleblowers, and, effectively, whether her First Amendment rights are more important than the government's interest.