Restaurateur at center of Kansas newspaper battle bursts into tears as she breaks her silence to reveal hate mail she’s got for accusing reporter of accessing information about her DUI illegally

• Kari Newell, 46, filed a police report against the paper, which led to a raid
• The newspaper co-owner, Joan Meyer, 98, died the following day
• Newell is unapologetic and still believes the paper was wrong, despite officials saying they obtained the DUI information through public records 

The restaurant owner whose battle with a Kansas newspaper led to a viral raid has broken her silence to reveal the hate mail she’s received blaming her for the death of the publication’s 98-year-old owner.

Kari Newell, 46, cried as she shared the hate she’s received since her intervention at a Marion City Council meeting on August 7 led to the raid, which some have blamed for the death of Marion County Record co-owner Joan Meyer.

Speaking to The Kansas City Star, Newell claimed she and her businesses have been targeted after the raid – and Meyer’s death – became national news.

‘I’ve probably got 600 or 700 messages saying I have blood on my hands, that I should go to jail for manslaughter, sued for wrongful death, that I killed that poor woman,’ Newell told the local news outlet. 

‘I’m probably approaching 5,000 pieces of hate mail.’

Newell believes Phyllis Zorn, a reporter for the paper, had illegally accessed information about her DUI charge from 2018 that showed she had been driving without a valid driver’s license for 15 years. 

As the town’s council was set to discuss whether to give Newell a to a two-year liquor license for one of her restaurants, editors at the Marion County Record had decided to not pursue a story about her DUI.

Still, Newell went after the paper during the meeting, accusing a council member of obtaining the information and ‘negligently and maliciously’ sharing it with others, and claiming she would notify the Marion County attorney.

Four days later, police chief Gideon Cody raided the Marion County Record newsroom. The homes of the councilwoman and the Meyers were also raided. Joan Meyer died the next day.

Since then, people have called her ‘Hitler,’ ‘fascist’ and ‘the devil,’ she added, showing the texts from strangers.

Newell said she’s been forced to shut off the comments and online reservations for her restaurant Chef’s Plate at Parlour 1886, which is inside the Historic Elgin Hotel.

But Newell remains unapologetic and convinced that it was the newspaper that was on the wrong, and that she did not know police would raid any of the homes or the paper. However, the Kansas Department of Revenue has said the information was public record.

Surprisingly, paper co-owner and Joan’s son Eric Meyer agrees that Newell isn’t the villain people should be focusing on.

‘She is a pawn,’ he told The Kansas City Star. ‘I think she was a convenient excuse used by other people to get at us. I think she’s a patsy in that regard.’

Before the August 11 raid, Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody wrote in an affidavit that Marion County Record reporter Phyllis Zorn either impersonated Newell or lied about her reasoning to retrieve the records.

Cody wrote in the affidavit that the Department of Revenue told him that those who downloaded the information were Record reporter Zorn and someone using the name ‘Kari Newell.’

He wrote that he contacted Newell who said ‘someone obviously stole her identity.’

But Zorn, publisher and editor Eric Meyer and the newspaper’s attorney said that no laws were broken when she accessed a public state website for information on the restaurant owner.

Police seized computers, personal cellphones and a router from the newspaper in the raid, but all items were released Wednesday after the county prosecutor concluded there wasn’t enough evidence to justify the action. 

The newspaper had Newell’s driver’s license number and date of birth because a source provided it, unsolicited, Meyer said. 

The tip about Newell’s DUI was sent to Zorn by a woman called Pam Maag.

Maag said she received the records from Kari’s estranged husband, Ryan Newell.

Some legal experts believe the raid on August 11 violated a federal privacy law that protects journalists from having their newsrooms searched.

While others say it violated a Kansas law that makes it more difficult to force reporters and editors to disclose their sources or unpublished material.

Cody defended the raid in a Facebook post soon after it happened, saying the federal law shielding journalists from newsroom searches makes an exception specifically for ‘when there is reason to believe the journalist is taking part in the underlying wrongdoing.’

The Record received an outpouring of support from other news organizations and media groups after the raid.

Meyer said it has picked up at least 4,000 additional subscribers, enough to double the size of its press run, though many of the new subscriptions are digital.

He blamed the stress from the raid for the death of his mother Joan on August 12. Her funeral services were Saturday.

She collapsed and died ‘mid-sentence’ after refusing to eat due to being in complete shock over the raid.

Before Joan died, she told The Wichita Eagle about the raids: ‘These are Hitler tactics, and something has to be done.’

Meyer said that when he woke his mother to offer her breakfast she died mid-sentence.

‘I am perturbed — I carefully chose that word — as all get out about them raiding our office, but what bothers me most is a 98-year-old woman spent her last day on earth feeling under attack by bullies who invaded her house.’

He did not give more details about the newspaper’s probe into the police chief, but said: ‘I really don’t think it would be advisable for me to say what it was we were investigating, other than to characterize the charges as serious.

It emerged on Tuesday that Cody was also being investigated by the newspaper over allegations of sexual misconduct.

Cody became chief of the Marion County Police Department in late April, after leaving the Kansas City police amid allegations of sexual misconduct.