Tim Chapman and Katie Hibson, two James Madison University journalism students, had charges brought against them by the James Madison University Judicial Affairs Office for committing university policy violations while reporting for a story, according to The Cavalier Daily. Supposedly, the two students violated university rules by interviewing students inside the dormitory without being properly escorted by a resident.

The students were investigating an incident on campus where a peeping tom was speculated to have been seen. They were gathering information to report for their campus newspaper, The Breeze, when they were told to leave.

On October 27th, after the judicial charges were brought, the Virginia Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists demanded the university to drop all charges against the two students.

There has been a media firestorm over students at Northwestern University being served subpoenas because of their work surrounding the murder conviction of Anthony McKinney. It seems that even student journalists are not immune to the politics of the real world. 

Our Take:

The word that describes this situation is simply: unnecessary. Were these students causing such a huge scene that the only action was to force them to leave? More than likely they were mature adults trying to do their job, which is informing the campus of events that pertain to them, especially of their safety on campus.

The claim is that these two students were violating campus safety rules by loitering in a residence hall of which they were not residents. In actuality, they were trying to alert people to be aware of their surroundings because of the possibility of an unknown predator lurking on campus.

The actions taken by James Madison University were totally out of line. It seems a bit unfair to punish students who are merely trying to protect their campus by exposing as much information as possible about this event.

Apparently, the Virginia Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists disagrees with the decision, and I totally agree. It will likely change the way reporters on this campus approach another story.