The Worcester Telegram & Gazette was in court yesterday (Dec. 30th) will be in court on Jan 15th seeking a judicial review and forced re-release of the most excessively redacted complaints in the Rojas file. Months could pass before a judge finally forces their release and unveiling.
The WPD claims the redactions were to preserve people’s privacy, but it was pretty clear to me from my brief review of my own records that the redactions were more about covering up than preserving Officer Rojas’ or anyone else’s privacy.
I kept a copy of my original complaint, which when compared with the WPD redacted version, now reveals the 142 words the WPD doesn’t want you to see.
You be the judge.
The following 142 words were redacted by the WPD from my original complaint against Officer Mark Rojas. The unredacted complaint may be read in full HERE. This represents just 2.5 pages of “my file”.
“to distribute fliers to”
“outreach in Main South”
“drama”
“drama”
“against the fence”
“over the fence”
“passing out this flier, which I held out for him which he stopped to read”
“passing out fliers”
“the fliers I was holding”
“the fliers”
“FOX TV camera”
“my camera bag”
“fumbling to get my camera out, remove the lens cap and power it on”
“a photojournalist”
“published an article about the decision to bring the FOX TV program to”
“take a photo of the camera crew”
“against fence/railing”
“my camera flash went off with my first picture”
“w/ the camera”
“the camera strap around my wrist so I don’t drop it”
“the camera”
“the camera”
“retaining wall”
“fidgeting w/ my camera”
“smash your camera”
“and the TV camera”
“down the sidewalk”
“a FOX producer”
“delete the photos off of there”
“David Moore”
“down the street”
cross-outs
none of the cross-outs seem to be related to privacy concerns