One thing that happened during the month I wasn't blogging was the Wilton road-rage stabbing.

You can't make this stuff up.

From all police reports, Frank Soriano (who I heard from a credible source has a history of road-rage) rammed Jeffery Streicher's car from behind on Northern Pines in Wilton.

According to police, Soriano (the author of a book on alien abductions who has given numerous interviews on his alien abductions) ran toward Streicher, a life-long boxer, and a fight ensued.

For more, read here: (Man stabbed several times in Wilton, possibly after a road rage incident, Road rage incident results in stabbing)

Later, Streicher appeared at the Saratogian office out of the blue to give me his side of the story. When he said "Do you want to see my car," I thought he was going to show me the damage to the back of his vehicle.

"That's my blood," he said, pointing in the open driver-side door to the blood-soaked seat. My mouth was agape. There was still blood on the door, the lock, the trunk-- everywhere.

Anyway, read his side here: (Alleged Wilton stabber arrested again on charges stemming from Sept. 1 incident , )


Be sure to check out the video for this story in the first few links because that is the point of this blog post.
Following the incident, our video was subpoenaed by the district attorney's office (no doubt because it was so good).

In a decision that went all the way to the top of the Journal Register company, our lawyers fought the subpoena.

According to the editors, lawyers and corporate-types in the company, it was a matter of principle. The DA's office didn't just subpoena the video we ran, they subpoenaed the video we didn't run-- as in all of the outtakes and clips that wound up on the cutting room floor (figuratively--it's digital-- and we don't have a "cutting room").

That is tantamount to subpoenaing a reporters' notebook.

According to our corporate lawyer, the NYS Shield Law protects us from having to divulge confidential sources as well as notebooks that don't necessarily have any confidential info therein.

And to be clear, the extra video was not cut because of confidentiality, it was cut because for every 2 minute video you see on our site, there is at least a few more minutes you don't see-- often several (at times I shoot a half-hour of video and use 90 seconds).

In the end, the subpoena was withdrawn and we supplied them with the video we ran. WIN WIN.

Of course, this is another example of the changing world of journalism. There was nothing we needed to hide on the video, but with this being the new world, according to our lawyers, we didn't want to be a "doormat" for every request from the DA.

But now the precedent has been set. Video cuts = notebooks. Mark it down.

I'm just waiting for the day we get a subpoena for the paper's Facebook Friend requests.