Hiding goods within a store In the UK there is a grassroots campaign in which participants hide newspaper publications they consider to be of a dubious moral or political standing with the intent of making it more difficult for the readers of said publication to obtain it, or at least it removing it from public view. The newspaper most frequently targeted has branded judges and elected members of Parliament as traitors and is well known as a source of 'fake news' to the point where it cannot be cited as a source in Wikipedia. Usually they cover the offending title with another, but in some cases move the goods to another unrelated part of the shop (often the toilet-roll section.) In my research I saw Fiup's answer to "Proving Theft From a Store" which seems to suggest that since the legitimate owner (the shop) is not being deprived of the goods it would suggest that no criminal act is being committed. Clearly a store can ask anyone partaking in the this activity to leave (and may choose to ban them from the premises) but is the mover of papers committing an offence since their intent is not to remove them from the store? Note: I have no intent to join this movement, just curious.
You've already found an answer to the question about theft in the linked answer, that since they do not take the goods, nor even intend to take them away permanently there can be no consideration for theft here. There may be a case of criminal damage though, reading up on CPS website brings up some interesting points, notably: Damage is not defined by the Act and what constitutes damage is a matter of fact and degree. The courts have construed the term liberally and included damage that is not permanent such as smearing mud on the walls of a police cell. The damage need not be visible or tangible if it affects the value or performance of the property. It could be argued that by rearranging merchandise in a shop, with clear intent to disrupt its operation you are affecting the performance of the store, and that just may fall under criminal damage. Especially when done regularly, or in an organized way; something that demonstrably affects the business. Though in practice I doubt that anyone, besides the people &quot;hiding&quot; the papers, will care. Shelves in most newspaper stores are inspected and restocked multiple times a day, and as a part of normal customers routine stuff gets moved around and later corrected by staff.
It is legal, at least in the US, for a store (or other entity) to refuse to sell any item to any individual for any non-prohibited reason (prohibited reasons are typically things like race or religion). More over, in various US jurisdictions, it is prohibited to "furnish" alcohol to a "minor" (for example, under California's ABC law), which can be interpreted as prohibiting to an adult if they reasonably suspect that adult will pass the alcohol onto the "minor". This is to prevent "straw" sales. Additionally, larger chains generally prefer to have harmonized policies across branches, and where practical, across state lines, so will have policies that can accomodate multiple alcohol control regimes.
Publishing government records is pretty classic First Amendment-protected activity. Keeping in mind that one can find a lawyer to sue for anything, I think that person would likely be operating well within the law. One thing in particular that I'd recommend staying aware of is how one might attempt to monetize this endeavor. There have been a lot of sites publishing arrest records, court records, and mugshots, and then charging people to have them removed to keep them from popping up in a Google search for those people's names. That is -- rightly -- regarded as sketchy behavior; while several states have passed laws prohibiting that business model, I don't believe any such law exists in Washington State at this point.
The reason this section exists is pretty well stated in an English case: Holmes v. Governor of Brixton Prison and Another. In paragraph 12, they discuss the law of theft in England, and note that under the law there as it stood in 2004 (and reaching back to principles of common law, which are often but not always shared with the US), deception required causing someone to believe something. A machine has no mind, cannot think, and can't be made to believe anything -- it sees an input and mechanically performs some response in response to that input. For instance, suppose you were to discover someone's bank account number and printed a check of your own that had that number on it. You then make that check up to look like it's a check from the someone else to you, and deposit it to an ATM; you then withdraw however much is available immediately. In all likelihood, no human will see that check until the victim looks into why they're significantly poorer than they remembered, so no human was deceived. The only things that were possibly deceived were the computers involved in the check-clearing process. But they don't have a mind: as far as they're concerned, they see pixels, pass them through an algorithm, and then send a message to another computer at the bank with certain information (which a human recognizes as an image of a check and an amount of money, but an ATM doesn't know what it means for something to be an image of a check). The machine then mechanically pushes bills out a slot. They don't think the check's real, don't think it's fake, and don't think it's a check: they're just piles of semiconductors and wires acting in accordance with the laws of physics. If you gave a check like this to a check-cashing place, it's clearly theft by deception: you make the human there (falsely) think you have a legitimate check, and they then pay you money based on it. But these days, a lot of this stuff is automated. Alaska's legislature didn't want you to get out of theft by deception charged because something was automated. So, they said that a machine could be deceived. This isn't a crime by itself; you can't be charged with deceiving a machine. You are charged with an offense under the chapter that involves deception. What 11.46.985 does is say you can't argue "this wasn't deception because only the machine was deceived."
We may soon have a more definitive answer. A Grand Junction, Colorado newspaper is suing a politician for calling it "fake news", and the resolution of that case and the hypothetical that you propose would turn on the same legal principle. It is highly unlikely that such a lawsuit would prevail, because "fake news" probably doesn't constitute libel per se, because the comment could be construed as hyperbole or as a statement of opinion (neither of which are actionable), and even potentially, because a "speech and debate clause" defense under the state constitution might apply (depending upon the context in which the statement was made by the politician). The context of the particular tweet cited generally defines specified organizations as "the FAKE NEWS media" rather than accusing them of any particular instance of making a false statement, so it is probably an opinion or hyperbole. But, if the statement were made knowing it was false or with reckless disregard as to truth or falsity, and if the term "fake news" in the context in which it was used could be legitimately construed the imply a statement of fact which is not true, it wouldn't be impossible for the lawsuit to succeed, and depending upon the context of the statement, it could have such an implication. A suit against Trump could also implicate Presidential immunity doctrines which are more robust than immunity doctrines for other public officials, particularly if the "fake news" comment could be construed as part of the official duties of the President (for which there is absolute immunity) as opposed to his unofficial duties. The immunity question is a closer one than the question on the merits of defamation law about which there is much more case law to flesh out what is and isn't covered.
First, the press release is copyrighted from its inception and may have been work for hire (a close call since you wrote them for an LLC and the LLC had a deal with them). There is a copyright in someone, although the absence of a copyright notice limits the remedies available for infringement. Second, a link is not a copyright violation. Third, copyright protects an exact manifestation of an idea or description of a fact, not the idea or fact itself. Fourth, there are two different doctrines that could protect an exact copy of a press release. One of two doctrines, which applies if the press release has been released to the public, is an implied license. Press releases are meant for the general public and reprinting them when that is their intended purpose is an implied grant of permission. In the same way, if you have an unfenced front yard to a concrete path leading to your front door, anyone who wishes to meet with you has an implied license to walk up to your door and knock. Whether this implied license can be revoked or not is a harder question. The other of the two doctrines, which is not limited to press releases that have been released, is "fair use". In this situation, when the work was short, has been released to others, has limited literary value, transmits unprotected facts relevant to you, relates facts that may also be a matter of public record (the sale anyway), and you aren't trying to profit from the text of the press releases themselves just from the facts that they convey, the case for fair use is pretty decent even though this is a business use. Ultimately, however, to be squeaky clean and avoid litigation, you can link rather than regurgitate the press releases, and can write your own statements about the facts in them from scratch. This information is not privileged or trademarked. If you didn't sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) or if they were released to the public, they aren't subject to trade secret protection either. If they were only released to the customer whose sale was involved and there is an NDA they could conceivably be trade secrets but even then the case would be very weak since the information doesn't create value by virtue of being kept secret.
The term doesn’t come up Because, AFAIK, there are no circumstances where being ignorant of the law allow a person to escape culpability. There are, however, laws that allow ignorance of the facts to be an excuse. For example, a person who receives stolen goods where it is reasonable to believe that they aren’t is not guilty of the crime (although the still don’t own the goods).
It is the use of a "menace" which creates the crime, not the nature or validity of the demand. That's not correct. You've inadvertently missed the other element of the offence: that it's an "unwarranted demand". A person is guilty of blackmail if, with a view to gain for himself or another or with intent to cause loss to another, he makes any unwarranted demand with menaces; and for this purpose a demand with menaces is unwarranted unless the person making it does so in the belief— (a) that he has reasonable grounds for making the demand; and (b) that the use of the menaces is a proper means of reinforcing the demand. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1968/60/section/21 For example, I may have reasonable grounds under the Consumer Rights Act to demand a refund for a faulty good. It might be sensible to moderate one's language, e.g. "If I do not receive a satisfactory response from you within 30 days of the date of this letter, I intend to issue proceedings against you in the county court without further notice. This may increase your liability for costs." vs. "If I do not receive the money from you within 30 days of the date of this letter I'll take you to the f***ing cleaners, sunshine." But the language doesn't make the demand unwarranted.