Reporters

A ban issued this month to keep reporters out of the rooms and corridors immediately behind the Los Angeles County supervisors' meeting room was extended this week to all non-county employees. Under the latest rule, supervisors or their staff must escort all visitors in the areas, where many department heads and aides watch the meetings on television screens. The most recent memorandum was requested by Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, who said he wanted staffers to address the "little dust-up" over a policy that kicked out only journalists, who had long had access to those areas for interviews.

State Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown closed his inquiry into the unauthorized tape recording of his and some staff members' conversations with reporters, saying the tapings were done only by a rogue lieutenant who quit after his actions were revealed. The findings, released Monday evening, follow former communications director Scott Gerber's acknowledgment that he secretly taped interviews with reporters from The Times, the San Francisco Chronicle and the Associated Press that were conducted with Brown and other justice officials.

Joe the Plumber is putting down his wrenches and picking up a reporter's notebook. Samuel J. Wurzelbacher, who became a household name during the presidential campaign, is heading to Israel as a war correspondent for the conservative website Pajamas TV. He'll spend 10 days letting Israel's " 'Average Joes' share their story," he told WNWO-TV in Toledo, Ohio.

Iran's judiciary spokesman said a U.S. journalist detained about a month ago was being held in a prison north of the capital, Tehran. Ali Reza Jamshidi said 31-year-old Roxana Saberi was being held in Evin prison on a court order. He refused to provide further details. A day earlier, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hasan Qashqavi said that Saberi was engaged in "illegal" activities because she continued working in Iran after the government revoked her press credentials in 2006.

A royal chauffeur was suspended over allegations that he gave undercover reporters a tour of Queen Elizabeth II's luxury limousines and other sensitive areas of her Buckingham Palace home in exchange for money. London police said they were examining the allegations and holding talks on security with staff at the London palace following reports of the breach. The News of the World tabloid said two of its reporters, posing as wealthy Middle Eastern businessmen, were shown around secure areas of Buckingham Palace and allowed to sit inside Bentleys used by the royal family.

Re "2 U.S. reporters get 12 years in N. Korea," June 8 While I admire the courage of most reporters working in foreign lands, and I'm grateful for the service they provide, I can't help but question the judgment of reporters who cross the line into foolishness by doing something like entering the territory of an evil regime or getting close enough to the border to be captured. By allowing themselves to be put in the position of being used as bargaining chips on the international stage, these reporters have now placed all of us in jeopardy -- forcing the United States to compromise or to limit our diplomatic options.

An independent journalist who had criticized Kyrgyzstan's government has died after surgery for injuries he said he suffered during a beating by police, relatives and colleagues said. The death of Almaz Tashiyev, 32, came after a series of attacks on reporters and shortly before next week's presidential election. The Interior Ministry said prosecutors were investigating the alleged attack. Critics of President Kurmanbek Bakiyev say the government has tried to stifle opposition ahead of the July 23 election, in which he is widely expected to win a second term.

The U.S. military in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere assesses the content and tone of the work of individual reporters to prepare for trips and interviews by those reporters, according to defense and military officials. But the officials denied that the analysis has been used to exclude journalists from embedding with U.S. military units in combat zones or to bar them from interviewing military personnel. A controversy has arisen over work performed for the U.S. military command in Afghanistan by the Rendon Group, a contractor that classifies reporters' stories as positive, negative or neutral in relation to military objectives.

The Senate Judiciary Committee this week will take up a new version of a reporter shield law. The bipartisan-backed legislation, which establishes a qualified privilege for reporters to withhold the names of confidential sources who provide information under promise of confidentiality, has been the subject of intensive lobbying by media companies for years. The companies were reacting to an increase in the number of subpoenas to reporters during the George W. Bush administration, including the highly publicized case involving disclosure of the identity of Valerie Plame when she was a covert CIA officer.

Re "Reporters' access restricted," Oct. 15 The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors should read the U.S. Constitution allowing freedom of the press. Why is the board restricting access? Is there something to hide? If lobbyists and union representatives are entitled to conduct business in hallways during board meetings, then the journalists should be too. It is increasingly important for reporters to have access to local politicians. Supervisors are rarely in the spotlight. We need the information provided by newspapers to keep us updated and politicians honest.