Author Salman Rushdie has been relieved of the obligation to provide private notes regarding his stabbing to the man accused of attacking him, a ruling made by a judge on Thursday. Hadi Matar, the alleged assailant, had requested access to the notes as he readied for trial. Matar’s lawyers had previously subpoenaed Rushdie and his publisher, Penguin Random House, for all source material related to Rushdie’s memoir “Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder,” in which he recounted the 2022 attack at the Chautauqua Institution. However, the judge deemed the request too extensive and burdensome, indicating that the material sought could be obtained from the book itself. Additionally, the judge cited New York’s Shield law, safeguarding journalists from divulging confidential sources or material, as protecting Rushdie and the publisher from such demands.
Elizabeth McNamara, an attorney for Penguin Random House, pointed out that compelling Rushdie to surrender personal materials would essentially retraumatize him. Matar, from Fairview, New Jersey, pleaded not guilty to charges of assault and attempted murder following his indictment by a Chautauqua County grand jury. The incident occurred when he allegedly rushed the stage and stabbed Rushdie as he was set to address a crowd of about 1,500 people at an amphitheater in the Chautauqua Institution in western New York.
Rushdie, aged 77, had lived in hiding for years after an edict by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989 called for his death over his novel “The Satanic Verses,” which some Muslims viewed as blasphemous. Despite this, Rushdie has been able to travel freely over the last two decades. In a separate development, the trial for Matar has been rescheduled from September to October to accommodate Rushdie’s travel plans and that of City of Asylum Pittsburgh Director Henry Reese, who was moderating the event where the attack took place and was also injured. Both Rushdie and Reese are expected to provide testimony during the trial. Jury selection is now slated to begin on October 15, according to District Attorney Jason Schmidt.
