Editor and Publisher Eric Meyer considers a question from reporters about the aftermath of a local police raid on his newspaper’s offices and his home, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2023, in Marion, Kan. Meyer said the newspaper will not change its coverage of the community because of the raids. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
The offices of the Marion County Record await the arrival of copies of its latest weekly edition, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2023, in Marion, Kan. The paper found its work on that edition hindered because of raid on its offices and the home of its publisher on Aug. 11, 2023, by local police. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
A stack of the latest weekly edition of the Marion County Record sits in the back of the newspaper’s building, awaiting unbundling, sorting and distribution, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2023, in Marion, Kan. The newspaper’s front page was dedicated to two stories about a raid by local police on its offices and the publisher’s home on Aug. 11, 2023. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
Television reporters and videographers from stations across the region prepare to do reports on the aftermath of local police raids on the Marion County Record, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2023, in Marion, Kan. The raids on the newspaper’s offices and the home of its publisher received international attention and were widely condemned by press freedom watchdog groups. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
Darvin Markley, a Marion, Kansas, resident, speaks to the City Council about the local police’s raids on the local weekly newspaper and the home of its publisher, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. Markley says the police chief, who led the raid, should have been fired. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
Front pages for the Marion County Record’s latest weekly edition are displayed on a window at its offices, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. Local police raided the newspaper’s offices and home of its publisher, bringing the small central Kansas town to international attention. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
Marion, Kansas Vice Mayor Ruth Herbel, right, confers with fellow City Council member Kevin Burkholder, left, before a council meeting, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. It was the council’s first meeting since local police raided the weekly newspaper, its publisher’s home and Herbel’s home on Aug. 11, over allegations that the newspaper and Herbel violated a local business owner’s privacy. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
A bag that held Marion County Record reporter Deb Gruver’s personal cellphone is pinned to the wall behind her desk in the Record’s newsroom, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. Police seized Gruver’s cellphone and her computer tower in an Aug. 11, raid, and it was later turned over to a computer forensics auditing company hired by the newspaper’s attorney, which put it in the bag. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
Darvin Markley, a Marion, Kansas, resident, follows a Marion City Council meeting with Marion County Record editor and publisher Eric Meyer sitting to his front left, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. Markley is upset about an Aug. 11 raid by local police on the newspaper’s offices and Meyer’s home and called for the police chief to be fired. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
A tribute to Joan Meyer, the late 98-year-old co-owner of the Marion County Record, sits outside the weekly newspaper’s office, Monday, Aug. 11, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. Her son, editor and publisher Eric Meyer, blames the stress from police raids on the newspaper offices and their home for her death on Aug. 12, the day after the raids. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
The offices of the Marion County Record weekly newspaper sit across the street from the Marion County, Kansas, courthouse, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kansas. The newspaper’s aggressive coverage divided its central Kansas community of about 1,900 residents even before a raid by local police on its offices on Aug. 11, brought it and the town to international attention. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
Eric Meyer, publisher of the Marion County Record, talks to one of his reporters in the weekly newspaper’s newsroom, Monday, Aug. 21, 2023, in Marion, Kan. Local police raided the newspaper on Friday, Aug. 11, seizing computers and cellphones, and some of the equipment has been returned. (AP Photo/John Hanna) 
This screen grab of security camera footage provided by Eric Meyer shows his mother, Joan Meyer, ordering police officers to get out of her house as they searched it on Aug. 11, 2023, in Marion, Kan. Joan Meyer, who was 98, died the next day. Her son, Marion County Record Editor and Publisher Eric Meyer, blames his mother’s death on the stress caused by the search. (Eric Meyer via AP)
MARION, Kan. | Newly released video shows the 98-year-old mother of a Kansas newspaper publisher confronting police officers as they searched her home in a raid that has drawn national scrutiny, at one point demanding: “Get out of my house!”
Video released by the newspaper Monday shows Joan Meyer shouting at the six officers inside the Marion, Kansas, home she shared with her son, Marion County Record Editor and Publisher Eric Meyer. Standing with the aid of a walker and dressed in a long robe or gown and slippers, she seems visibly upset.
“Get out of my house … I don’t want you in my house!” she said at one point. “Don’t touch any of that stuff! This is my house!” she said at another.
The raids of the newspaper and the homes of the Meyers and a City Council member happened on Aug. 11, after a local restaurant owner accused the newspaper of illegally accessing information about her. Joan Meyer died a day later. Her son said he believes that the stress contributed to her death.
A prosecutor said later that there was insufficient evidence to justify the raids, and some of the seized computers and cellphones have been returned. Meanwhile, the initial online search of a state website that the police chief cited to justify the raid was legal, a spokesperson for the agency that maintains the site said Monday.
The raid on the Record put it and its hometown of about 1,900 residents in the center of a debate about press freedoms protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and Kansas’ Bill of Rights. It also exposed divisions in the town over local politics and the newspaper’s coverage of the community, and put an intense spotlight on Police Chief Gideon Cody, who led the raids after the newspaper had asked questions about his background.
“As far as Chief Cody goes, he can take his high horse he brought into this community and giddy-up on out of town,” Darvin Markley, a Marion resident, said during a Monday afternoon City Council meeting. “The man needs to go. He needs to be fired.”
Cody did not attend Monday’s meeting or respond to email and cellphone messages seeking comment. He said in affidavits used to obtain the warrants that he had probable cause to believe that the newspaper and City Council member Ruth Herbel, whose home was also raided, had violated state laws against identity theft or computer crimes.
Both Herbel and the newspaper have said they received a copy of a document about the status of the restaurant owner’s license without soliciting it. The document disclosed the woman’s license number and date of birth, which are required to check the status of a person’s license online and gain access to a more complete driving record. The police chief maintains they broke state laws to do that, while the newspaper and Herbel’s attorneys say they didn’t.
Herbel, the city’s vice mayor, presided over the City Council’s meeting Monday, its first since the raids. It lasted less than an hour, and Herbel announced that council members would not discuss the raids — something its agenda already had said in an all-caps statement in red followed by 47 exclamation points. She said the council will address the raids in a future meeting.
While Herbel said after the meeting that she agrees that Cody should resign, other City Council members declined to comment. Mike Powers, a retired district court judge who is the only candidate for mayor this fall, said it’s premature to make any judgments.
Meyer said the newspaper plans to file a lawsuit over the raid of its offices and his home.
Meyer has noted that among the items seized were a computer tower and personal cellphone of a reporter who was uninvolved in the dispute with the local restaurant owner — but who had been investigating why Cody left a Kansas City, Missouri, police captain’s job in April before becoming Marion police chief.
Legal experts believe the police raid on the newspaper violated a federal privacy law or a state law shielding journalists from having to identify sources or turn over unpublished material to law enforcement.
The Kansas Bureau of Investigation continues to examine the newspaper’s actions.
Salter reported from O’Fallon, Missouri. Associated Press writer Heather Hollingsworth in Mission, Kansas, contributed to this report.
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