Elsebeth Baumgartner Arrested

I just spoke with our friends in Georgia, who had just spoken to Bryan and Mandy DuBois, who called from the court house where they appeared today.

If you don’t recall the story, Bryan DuBois is the editor of an Ohio based blog under judicial fire for being a judicial whistleblower. He and co-defendent Elsebeth Baumgartner were scheduled to be in court this morning. The entire chronology of the case is located here. Here is the latest from the courthouse, as Kathryn Weitzel of the Libertarian Action Network reports it:

In one of Ohio’s largest first amendment violation cases, the defendant taken into arrested in court right before the jury trial began. Elsebeth Baumgartner and Bryan DuBois have been under fire for exposing local corruption in Ohio. Their crime? Blogging.

Baumgartner and DuBois filed papers one week ago with the Ohio Supreme Court attempting to stay the trial because of judicial bias. Their affidavit claims a conflict of interest concerning the Judge that initially brought up charges against them.

Their trial was scheduled for 9AM this morning in the Cuyahoga County Justice Center. According to the second hand report, Judge Shirly Saffold revoked Elsebeth Baumgartner’s bond immediately after Baumgartner tried to file a motion of continuance to amend the affidavit in the case it was denied.

Baumgartner had spoken just three words when Judge Saffold, who had been walking away from the bench at the time, suddenly returned to the microphone and called for the deputy of the court. Saffold then said, “I’m revoking her bond, arrest her.”

As more information becomes available on this story, we will continue to report it. That is until they pry the First Amendment from my cold, dead fingers.

Update: A more complete rendition of what happened is now available at Erie Voices.