Friday, September 22, 2006

When the Raleigh News & Observer falls down

You may recall that late one night this past January, there was an unconfirmed report all the miners trapped in the Sago Mine had been found alive. Tragically, the unconfirmed report turned out to be false. All but one of the miners were found dead.

Some newspapers were careful to let their readers know the report was unconfirmed. They ran qualifying headlines.

Other newspapers ignored the lack of confirmation and ran headline stories saying without qualification the men had been found alive. The Raleigh News & Observer was one of those newspapers.

The N&O exec editor for news, Melanie Sill, refused to accept any responsibility for the N&O's error. It was all the AP's fault, the Governor of West Virginia's fault, the mine owners' fault, impossible press deadlines --- you get Sill's point.

When readers reminded Sill that many papers with the same information and deadlines had gotten the story right; and that she should accept responsibly for the N&O's errors, Sill dismissed them as people who "look for any opportunity to bash us." (You can read Sill's explanations and her "conversation" with readers here.)

Sill's "final words" to readers were: ""There are occasions when we fall down on our responsibilities; this isn't one of them."

That prompted me to post on Sill's thread the following comment :

Comment from: John [Visitor] • http://www.johnincarolina.com
01/04/06 at 21:24

Melanie,

You say: "There are occasions when we fall down on our responsibilities; this isn't one of them."

Give us a few examples of what you see as The N&O falling down on its responsibilities?

Thank you.

John
Sill never offered any examples. Maybe she was too busy taking calls from people who "look for any opportunity to bash" the N&O.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good points, John. But far worse were the N&O stories of March 24 and 25 that inflamed readers, gave cover to Nifong and called the accuser the "victim" numerous times.

Anonymous said...

This is the email I sent to Ben Niolet, Melanie Sill and Joe Neff of the NandO this past saturday.

"Liestoppers Blogspot is reporting this morning (9/23) that at yesterdays hearing, it was revealed that the Durham Police Department destroyed evidence. Tapes of radio transmissions on the night of the alleged crime have been erased, according to Liestopper's reporter who was at the hearing.

What do you all know about this? How could it happen?"

Walter Abbott
Ruston, LA

As of noon central time today, Monday, 9/25, I had recieved no response to the inquiry. So I phoned Ben Niolet (his number is at the end of his alleged news stories) and asked about DPD's destruction of evidence (audio tapes of police radio transmissions pertinent to the alleged crime) brought to light in Friday's hearing.

His response was, "I wouldn't phrase it that way." I made sure he understood that there was a motion outstanding to preserve that evidence, and that the DPD erased said tapes and while that motion was still outstanding. Niolet acknowledged he knew those facts.

I told him a lot of people who followed the case closely indeed DID consider it evidence destruction and that Liestoppers had a correspondent at the hearing. To which he opined that hearing are public and anyone can go and that news judgements are always made as to what is newsworthy.

Once again we find that we CANNOT depend upon the DriveBy Media to report what is happening in Durham. We must do it ourselves...