crime
By Jack Dickey
Mar 26, 2012 5:20 PM
A Jaguars Beat Writer Spent Friday Night In Jail After Allegedly Berating Cops At A Bar (And On The Phone) [UPDATE: Tania Freed!]
Jack Dickey
See update at 5:55 p.m.
We (and other outlets) quoted a bunch today from Florida Times-Union reporter Tania Ganguli's interview with Jaguars owner Shad Khan. Little did we know that Ganguli filed her copy after a rough weekend.
According to Ganguli's own paper, Jacksonville police dropped by the Brix Taphouse-which Deadspin's Jacksonville bureau chief Tim Burke describes as "a place that pretends to be fancy but is just another drunken beach establishment like all the others"-at 2 a.m., after Ganguli told an officer that a bar employee had pushed her to the ground.
Then, explains her own paper:
The officer determined her complaint was unfounded, a decision Ganguli disagreed with. She then called 911, the report says, and asked for other officers to assist.
As she continued to "yell into the phone at the 911 dispatcher," the report says, she was arrested and taken to the Duval County jail. She was released later Saturday.
And, by Monday, she had written the day's biggest NFL story and kept mum on Twitter. Follow your dreams, kids!
UPDATE (5:55 p.m.): Jacksonville police just announced they won't charge Ganguli for whatever happened Friday night, the Times-Union reports. They have also apologized to Ganguli.
More:
According to Police Chief Bruce Thomason, a charge of misusing 911 is rare enough that he reviewed the arrest report. Then he listened to her the 911 call, and decided not to press charges.
"It did not match up in my opinion with what was in the report," Thomason said. "I didn't believe she showed the obvious signs of intoxication that the officer indicated in his report; I did not hear the yelling.
The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.