Bay City News reports that U.S. District Judge William Alsup has turned down a request by freelance news photographer and blogger Josh Wolf (pictured) to be released from jail on a Thanksgiving furlough. Wolf, 24, has been imprisoned at the Federal Correctional Institution in the East Bay city of Dublin for 93 days on Alsup’s order for refusing to give a federal grand jury unaired portions of a videotape of an anarchist demonstration in San Francisco last year. Prosecutors say the unaired tape might show who torched a police car and injured a police officer. Wolf says the tape doesn’t show that, and he has offered to screen the video for the judge. Before denying Wolf’s bid for a Thanksgiving release, the judge said: “I hope you’ll take to heart that judges, no matter how sympathetic they may be to you, are sworn to uphold the law … Consider that this great country that has allowed you to be a journalist sometimes asks for something back.” (Photo by Luke Thomas of Fog City Journal)

A couple of sidebars:

• SF freelance journalist Richard Knee says the Wolf case is symptomatic of a disturbing trend.

• AP writer David Kravets reports on the debate over whether Wolf is a journalist.