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IPFS News Link • Censorship

The Feds Are Using a Gag Order To Censor a Critique of Its Prosecutions.

• https://reason.com, Scott Shackford

The liberty-loving attorneys of the Institute for Justice are teaming up with the Cato Institute to fight a federal policy that forbids defendants from discussing the terms of civil settlements they enter into with the federal government. If they don't keep their mouths shut, these defendants are threatened with harsher punishments.

The offending agency targeted in a federal lawsuit filed today is the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The Cato Institute wants to publish a book by an entrepreneur who believes he's the victim of prosecutorial overreach by the SEC. But he can't tell his story for fear of further prosecution.

Normally this is the point where we'd tell you who this person is and why the SEC went after him. But we cannot. As part of the agreement he reached to settle the matter, the plaintiff in the Cato suit had to accept a gag order that prevents him from discussing or criticizing the case. Even though the settlement does not require him to admit guilt, he is nevertheless forbidden from saying anything that would indicate that he thinks the "complaint is without factual basis."


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