Wayne County Circuit Court file room: Closed till further

Posted on July 26, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation]

Imagine the most populous county in Michigan with nearly 2 million people, more than 768,000 households and nearly 35,000 businesses located on 2,000 square miles.

Now imagine that county closing its court files to the public.

I’m talking about Wayne County, including Detroit and suburbs.

Want to check a lawsuit pending or past in Wayne County Circuit Court?

Forget it.

That’s what I was told Friday, July 25 when I drove 30 miles from Plymouth to Detroit expecting to sit down for an hour or two or three to study a file that might have helped me with a story I want to write.

I used to cover Wayne County Circuit Court when I was a reporter with The Detroit Free Press. That was in the early 1990s. So I knew where to go — a dingy, cramped corner room in the basement of the Coleman A. Young Building which houses Detroit city and Wayne County government offices.

I walked down the stairs, passed the barbershop, turned left and noticed the file room door was closed. Odd. It was also locked, too. On the door, someone had taped a crudely hand-lettered sign that said, “This room closed until further notice.”

I assumed the impossible had happened — that some efficiency expert had descended on Wayne County government and recommended consolidating records on the second floor.

But on the second floor, from behind the counter where lawyers file their lawsuits, a deputy clerk told me the files are off limits. There was a lightning strike June 27 that started a fire in a transformer and forced the evacuation of the files.

I was told that if I wanted more information, I should talk to the woman in the brown dress behind the counter. I walked over to a spot by the counter opposite where the woman in the brown dress was talking to someone on the phone. I could hear her side of the conversation. Somebody on the other end of the line was asking her the same questions I wanted to ask.

Here are the answers the caller got from the deputy clerk:

“The file room is closed until September… Only divorce judgments are available… I don’t know when they’re going to be returned… They’re out of the building… All of the files were taken out… I know where they went, but I’m not gonna tell you… I’m not gonna keep talkin to your stupid ass.”

After “stupid ass,” the clerk hung up.

Well, I felt great — I had the answers to all my questions without being called a “stupid ass.” Now I knew better than to ask where the files are being stored. I didn’t want my stupid ass to be kicked out of the building.

Have you heard anything quite this absurd? All the court files except divorce judgments are housed somewhere off campus. Well, why not set up a reading room so people can go and read the files? What’s so hard about that?

I wonder how Wayne County’s legal system can work if people can’t see the basic documents that underly every civil action at law.

Does that make me a “stupid ass”?

Drop me a line at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

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joelontheroad, 24/7

Posted on July 26, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation]

With rumors that the Detroit Free Press is mulling a twice-weekly publication schedule in tabloid form, I want to assure readers of joelontheroad.com that no publication cutbacks are being planned here.

Au contraire, I’m mulling (isn’t that a great word? Doesn’t mean a damn thing) a 7-day publication schedule that would fill the void if Michigan’s oldest daily dumps five days of publication. The idea occurred to me following a conference with fellow Free Press buyout retiree David Crumm. David, former Free Press religion writer, is editor and proprietor of the highly successful readthespirit.com religion and faith blog. He publishes Monday-Friday.

At joelontheroad, I’m afraid, we’ve been more than a bit hit or miss.

I’m told that blogs get fewer hits on weekends than on weekdays. The Michigan Messenger (michiganmessenger.com) which syndicates some of my columns, blows off the weekend and concentrates its fire on Monday, which is the biggie for the blogosphere.

Despite the collective blogo-wisdom, I’m giving serious thought to publishing on at least one of the weekend days. And as long as I’m doing it once, why not twice?

Why not? I’ve always considered joelontheroad as my own newspaper. And if you’re going to have a newspapeer, might as well do it every day. The news doesn’t stop for weekends, right?

Now, after 30 seconds of combined thought-bloviation, I’m going to plunge in. Yes, we’ll do it.

Seven days a week.

All I have to do is sell it to my staff.

Wish me luck!

Shoot me a line at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

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‘Sources say’ — Free Press mantra

Posted on July 24, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation]

I don’t give a rat’s ass whether the governor of Michigan called a federal prosecutor.

But I’m sick and tired of the Detroit Free Press dumping on the world its daily tabloid-style rants dressed up as journalism.

What really galls me is the proliferation of the “sources said” stories.

Know what I mean?

As in, “Sources: Granholm asked feds about mayor’s dad.”

That was the huge head that led the Saturday, July 19, 2008 Detroit Free Press.

God, I’m sick of their anonymous hype.

Think I’m exaggerating? Check the July 25 Free Press, with another Page One double-deck headline — “Mayor faces new probe for run-in with officers.” What’s this one about? Seems hizzoner maybe roughed up a process server. Or maybe not. He denies it. It’s a pissing match, back and forth, but on the record. Toward the end of the story, apparently hoping to stack the deck against Kilpatrick, the Free Press unleashes one, two (how many is not clear) nameless sources who diss the mayor. 

Who are these nameless chatterboxes? How credible are they? The Freepsters could tell us, but they don’t. Why are these people allowed to speak without attribution? Are they afraid for their jobs. Their lives? Or are they just every-day backstabbers running their mouths for the daily rag?

More and more, it seems, the Free Press can’t get stories without letting its chicken-hearted sources hide behind the “sources said” cloak. Remember the Sludgegate stories the Free Press recently broke about alleged bribe-taking by some of Detroit’s City Council members? That biggie was leaked, because federal court rules ban employees of the Justice Department handing out these off-the-record treasures. At least, that’s what the feds told me when I called for quotes. Hmmm. Maybe I should have bought somebody lunch. But it appears they are talking to the Free Press.

I have no evidence for this, no “sources said” to hide behind, but I believe the leaks are sanctioned from the top. More than likely the source was not a whistle-blower, but a federal foot soldier trying to tilt public opinion ahead of a trial. A policy leak. Taint the jury pool anyone? Did the newspaper let itself be used as a tool of “sources said”? Wouldn’t be the first time. But hey, makes a great headline.

The gist of the latest Free Press expose is that Gov. Granholm maybe tried to mess in an ongoing FBI investigation of Bernard Kilpatrick, father of Detroit’s embattled Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. The allegation is shaky as hell, and based entirely on “sources said.”

Granholm flat-out denies it.

I know, I know. Journalists never believe officials like Granholm. Remember what I.F. Stone said about considering all public officials liars, prima facie, until they prove otherwise? Sure, that goes for the governor. It also goes for inside sources at the federal building.

Oh well. Doesn’t stop the Free Press from forging ahead with a long story that assumes the allegations — from unnamed sources — are true.

And it follows, according to custom-made Free Press logic, that the guv must be lying because the paper’s buddies, presumably federal court insiders, must be telling the truth.

Course, the “sources” could be anyone. We have to trust the newspaper to be fair and honest.

Oh boy.

We just passed the 13th anniversary of July 13, 1995, the beginning of the longest newspaper strike in U.S. history.

Fair and honest was what the unions asked of the Detroit dailies. What they got was a lockout. Followed by a years-long attempt at breaking the unions. Nice bunch of guys, Gannett and Knight-Ridder.

How newspaper owners treat their workers is a fair measure, I believe, of how they treat their readers.

On July 13, 1995, the Detroit papers lost whatever credibility they still had after lying their way into the 1989 Joint Operating Agreement.

Now, nearly two decades later, they expect readers to bow down and believe every “sources said” diatribe they print.

Come on, Freepsters — give us some names. Let us be the judge your sources’ credibility — and of your own.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

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Detroit dailies: 116 take buyouts

Posted on July 23, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation]

I didn’t need an updated personnel directory to find the 17 Freepsters leaving the paper in the latest round of cost-cutting buyouts.

They’re all old time Detroit Free Press people. Easy to find them on my ancient Free Press staff list.

Detroit Media Partnership, owner of the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News, logged 116 volunteers for its latest retirement plan. The additional people came from newspaper support operations outside the Free Press. They’re 34 short of the papers’ goal of 150 workers taking buyouts.

In a the Detroit newspaper buyout, workers receive two weeks of salary for each year of service up to a maximum payout of 52 weeks.

I don’t have names of all 116, but I’ve received a list of most and maybe all of the Free Press editorial employees taking the buyout.

They will be missed.

It’s adios to Susan Ager, Brad Betker, Cindy Burton, Pat Chargot, Cathy Collison, Tina Croley, Joe Grimm, Steve Grimmer, Marty Hair, Pat Hartley, Tina Lam, Barb Loth, Hank Shemanske, John Smyntek, Angelo Veneri, Barb Woolf and Theresa Wilson.

Eighteen of us left the Free Press back in November in the first buyout round. That makes 35 very experienced members of the Free Press editorial staff will have left the paper in the last roughly eight months.

Quality of journalism is in free fall at the Free Press right now, and the loss of these experienced hands will only contribute to the rapid decline — in circulation, advertising and overall quality — of Michigan’s oldest daily newspaper.

Last week, I predicted that the Free Press soon will convert from broadsheet to tabloid format and publish a paper edition twice a week. I’m hearing that’s more than a rumor — it likely will happen. It’s just one more of a series of self-inflicted injuries the newspapers have committed since the 1980s. Under the category “Future of Newspapers,” I’ve written about that dismal chronology of stupidity and mendacity.

But it’s the 23 percent shortfall from the goal of 150 departures that has me really concerned. You see, the bigshots threatened layoffs if that goal wasn’t met.

An insider told me the bosses “feel happy” with 116.

Is that reassuring?

What happens if they feel shitty?

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

Posted in future of newspapers, retirement, Unions | Tagged , , , , , | 5 Comments

Sins of Mr. Warm

Posted on July 23, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation]

I want to apologize to readers for dowsing them with the backwoods locutions and curious grammaticisms of my recent guest writer, Luke Warm.

I had no idea Mr. Warm would wax on in such extraordinarily inappropriate language on the questionable topic of hunting Osama Bin Laden in the hills of eastern Los Angeles.

Having said that, I must concede that I have no real control over Mr. Warm, since he and I both operate in the normal conditions of the blogosphere — without copy editors or any other brake to stop us from publishing absurdities.

I suppose I could fire Mr. Warm, but without him, who would write content while I’m at lunch or on vacation?

Mr. Warm’s credentials impressed me. They seemed to fill a big void here at joelontheroad.com because unlike me, Mr. Warm actually has a formal academic Journalism degree.

Yes he does! It’s more than I, the proprietor of this blog, can claim.

Mr. Warm’s degree is from the Blovia Institute of North or South Carolina. The Blovia Institute is fully accredited by the Accreditation Association of Accreditors and the Accreditors Association of Accreditation, or AAA-AAA.

You can’t do better than Triple-A-Squared.

That’s why I’m kind of disappointed in the quality so far of Mr. Warm’s writing.

I thought his work would add some luster to my blog.

Guess I was wrong.

Oh well, too late to change.

Afraid I’m stuck with Luke Warm.

Where else could I find a writer who works without pay?

So let’s welcome Luke Warm to the blogosphere, aka the Internet Sweatshop.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

Posted in Joel's J School, People, Places | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Huntin fer Osamy

Posted on July 22, 2008 by admin

By Luke Warm
Guest Writer

[donation]

Hey! Did I say Obama, nutcase?

Negatory, good buddy. I did not. I done writ OSAMY. As in Al Qaidee. I’m not no John McCain, see, tryin to get our next Chief Executative assasserated before he even gets to be President.

Target One: Osama Bin Laden

Target One: Osama Bin Laden

No, sirree. Okay, noodle-noggin, here’s what happened. So help me Jehosaphat. Me an ma boy was a hikin in them hills outside a Los Angelopes, Californee, when we heard tell America’s Most Wanted Criminal might be found right in them there very identicated selfsame mountain foothills. Now, this locus of all puntos happens to be right outside the pretty lil town a Whittier, right smack dab there in Californeeyay.

Now me and my kid was not born yestiddy, and we knowed the C, the I and the A been a huntin Osamy Bin Ladel in the foothills of Pakerstan ever since our boys lost the son of a pighock in Tory Bory back there in ought one or two, whichever it was or were. So they been lookin for this butthead seven or eight years and come up dry ever time.

Maybe we uns could help is what I’m a thinkin. Performin our obligatos as citizens. So when m’ boy an me heard we might find Osamy right here in Californee, we done done took off a runnin. We was no fools, either or ayether. Neether nor nayther, if you will or won’t. We had a wupon — a air rifle that shoots lil chunks a lead about a thousand feet or so a second, give or take and approximatutely. You know how quick that is? Quicker than a hungry coyote in a room full a hens. Why, it’d pass a car like it was nailed to the road.

Faster than a fart outa church.

I was pretty durn sure Osama was up in them hills cause we had his pitcher with us. Yep, it had circles stamped on his face, and my son, he says he seen that face up in the hills there. He done forgot to tell me what he seed was jus a pitcher, not the real Osamy. But who cares? Nothin like a good manhunt, I says.

So we got us a posse an up in them hills we went. We had Osamy’s pitcher, so we figured we’d know the buzzard if we come upon the son of a gunther.

Well, we didn’t find hide nor hair of Osamy. Guess you done guessed that by now.

But did we have fun a huntin! We didn’t hunt far, neither or nayther. Ma boy, he done got that poster, you know, the one of Osamy with the circles around his face? Got it offa th Internot. He stuck it up against a bit a hill. Give us great satisfaction. Justice in the world after all. Set Osamy under one a them nopal cactusizes, and we walked back a honorable distance and done took turns shootin them lil pieces of lead at the son of a pistol.

I gotta tell ya, right off, my boy put a chunk a lead right through Osamy’s forehead. Woulda stopped im dead, too, if he’d a been real.

Author's son takes a shot at Osama target. Joel Thurtell photo.

Author's son takes a shot at Osama. Joel Thurtell photo.

Then it was ma turn, and that’s when Osamy, he done bit back. I put ma face right up to the sight and done fired off a roun. WHAMO!! Kick back. Durn gunsight nailed ma forehead, drew some blood.

Pissed me off, it did or done.

Nobody said huntin Osamy was easy work.

That done it. I was mad. I meant bizness. I done slung lead at that target and ripped a roun through his lip. Ma boy shot and got his face. Next turn, I put one through his nasal nose. I even got the booger in the heart. My kid got him in the head a couple more times. Punched enough holes in his turban to send Osamy back to the hatter’s, if ya will or won’t.

The author takes a shot at Osama. Adam Thurtell photo.

The author takes a shot at Osama. Adam Thurtell photo.

We figure we done pretty good, though. If that poster’d been Osamy, the bum’d be dead as a rooster on a spit right now.

Course, we didn’t GET Osamy. Not really.

I don’t feel bad.

Neither did the C, the I and the A.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

Posted in Joel's J School, People, Places | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Hizzoner vs. hizzoner

Posted on July 21, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell
Eat your heart out, Kwame.

You won’t see this in Detroit: A mob of people swarming the mayor, acting like he’s some rock star.

Like Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa had and affair and survived, though his marriage didn’t. What’s the difference?

Well, nobody’s charged him with perjury, for one.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa speaks at Los Angeles City College

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa speaks at Los Angeles City College. Joel Thurtell photo.

For another, the guy acts like a rock star. I got so close to Villaraigosa on Saturday afternoon, July 19, 2008, that I could have reached out and touched him. I could have spoken to him, too, except that even in the City of Angels not everyone is happy with hizzoner. A group of student dissidents pissed him off with some questions and suddenly he turned and very quickly left.

What was I doing near the mayor of LA?

My son Adam is a Michigander transplanted to LA. Loves the place. Went to college in Whittier. His girl friend, Alysha del Valle is — I’m not making this up — a fellow a journalist, graduate of the University of Southern California with a talk radio program on 96.3 FM and a cable TV show here in LA. Her dad went to high school with the mayor, who was not, of course, the mayor then. He was a torrential talker with a big dose of charisma even back in the day. He went on to be speaker of the California House of Representatives and now is mayor of the town that gives meaning to the word “sprawl.”

Los Angeles radio reporter Alysha Del Valle with Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villagairosa

Los Angeles radio reporter Alysha del Valle with Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villagairosa. Joel Thurtell photo.

Saturday was the mayor’s volunteer day. The Mayor’s Day of Service. Villaraigosa and 5,000 other Angelenos went out to work projects like street cleaning, working on city projects where hands were needed to move things along. Alysha was a volunteer, too. She was emcee to the speakers — including the mayor — who addressed the crowd of volunteers when they came downtown for a lunch at the Los Angeles City College.

Man, this guy does have charisma. What a talker. Such gusto. He has an aura. Compact, handsome in a rugged way, he seemed totally in control. Even when the students pissed him off, it was not evident to an outsider like me. I got the skinny on it later from Alysha, who’s known Villaraigosa all her life.

The dissidents were one or two people. They soured him, but failed to throw him off stride.

It was evident in every way this guy is a great politician. Very popular.

At the mike, Mayor Antonio Villagairosa. Joel Thurtell photo

At the mike, Mayor Antonio Villagairosa. Photos by Joel Thurtell

I watched and all the time kept thinking about Detroit, Kwamegate, a mayor charged with perjury, with lying about an affair under oath in an alleged attempt to obstruct a multi-million-dollar lawsuit against the city and himself.

That’s the difference. Villaraigosa’s affair was outed, but he moved on. Sad to say, his marriage fell apart. But he didn’t have a newspaper slamming him every day, a prosecutor rightfully investigating and charging him, a trial pending to determine if he’s guilty and a City Council bent on ousting him even before the jury decides.

The sun shone bright on the mayor of Los Angeles Saturday afternoon. His brush with a handful of protesters was like gnats annoying a lion compared to the self-inflicted troubles Kwame faces.

As I watched the tight knot of people all wanting to get close to hizzoner, I thought of Kwame, who’s been booed at public appearances.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villagairosa with admirers. Joel Thurtell photo.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villagairosa with admirers. Joel Thurtell photo.

Perception drives reality. How you’re treated depends on how you’re seen. And how you behave. Are you credible? Do you blame your troubles on racism? Claim someone else, some unknown author specializing in fictional text messages, wrote the love letters that appear to be correspondence with your chief of staff?

One gets the rock star treatment.

The other gets treated like a skunk.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

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Bad dream?

Posted on July 19, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

 

[donation]

 

Maybe jet lag  accounts for my awful dream.

 

It seemed as if I’d stepped into a Hollywood movie set for a film called “The Future of Newspapers.”

 

Except this scenario was scripted for one newspaper — The Detroit Free Press, the paper where I worked for more than 23 years. The newspaper that doesn’t want to be called a PAPER any more.

 

The dream, or vision, or hallucination happened when I was sleeping in a motel room in Los Angeles, where I’m visiting my son, Adam. I flew in Thursday morning, July 17, from Detroit. On the flight, I set my watch three hours ahead to California time. Right away, I forgot those three hours and began acting as if I was still in Michigan, on Eastern time. Suddenly, as we watched the end of the Batman I movie late Thursday on California time, I realized that in Michigan it was 2 a.m. and I was beat.

 

The next day, Friday, was just fine. I woke up on California time at 6 a.m., drove over to Adam’s house in Whittier. Picked up a copy of The New York Times at the Starbucks on Philadelphia at Greenleaf across from Nixon’s old law office, had some coffee and soft-boiled eggs at Adam’s and then we went wandering around downtown Whittier. He showed me a wonderful bookstore run by the Whittier Public Library where hardback books are priced at 50 cents and a buck. Wow. Bought six or eight hardbacks. Good thing I packed light.

 

The problem — the jet lag — hit me at six today, July 19, which is Saturday morning. My alarm went off and I felt so groggy, I decided to go back to sleep. That’s when it happened.

 

I had this vision, see, where I was walking down a street looking for a newspaper. I came upon a row of vending machines, but something was different. The plexiglas windows were shaped funny. They were vertical rectangles, made to fit a different style of newspaper.

 

Here was a blue and yellow box right here in Whittier, California, with the gothic Detroit Free Press nameplate. But what was this? Something about the shape. It’s up and down, no, why, it’s — it’s — no, this can’t be!

 

The headline is just what you’d expect — three inch letters spelling KWAMEGATE!! Nothing odd about that. Sexcapades, perfidy and crime. The scandal du jour. Nothing new.

 

It’s the SHAPE of the PAPER that makes this such a bad dream.

 

It’s a tabloid!

 

I remember in my dream thinking, Well, at least the format fits the content — sex and crime are Job One at the Freep these days.

 

But Michigan’s oldest newsPAPER now a TABLOID like News of the World and the National Enquirer?

 

This wasn’t the worst of the dream, though. In this vision, I went back to the vending machine the following day to buy a Free Press. Lo and behold, the box was empty. The following day, empty again. Why, they’d gone to printing the PAPER every third day!

 

What kind of PAPER is this?

 

Just as I muttered, “So long, Free Press, it was nice to know ya,” my alarm went off.

 

What a relief. It was all a dream.

 

It WAS a dream, wasn’t it?

 

Author’s note: I wish it were a dream. I’m hearing from people inside the Free Press that tabloid shaping and twice-a-week publication is a distinct possibility.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com   

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Paperless Free Press?

Posted on July 17, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation]

Did you know that the Detroit Free Press is now a news ORGANIZATION?

It’s not a newsPAPER any more.

Surprise! That object you’re reading with your morning coffee has gained three syllables.

What’s going on?

A Freepster tells me honchos at Michigan’s oldest newspaper are consciously cultivating the new wording.

NewsPAPER — not cool.

News ORGANIZATION — very hip.

Are they trying to prepare the staff for something, like maybe no more printing presses?

Managers have said they’re converting pell mell to the Internet.

Do they really mean it?

Sure would be strange not having a morning PAPER.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

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Free Press: Hang ’em high!

Posted on July 15, 2008 by admin

By Joel Thurtell

[donation}

In one short story on page A17 in the July 15, 2008 issue of The New York Times, an out-of-state paper, managed to capture the essence of a Detroit judge’s ruling Monday, July 14, in the perjury case — also known as the text message scandal — of Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff, Christine Beatty.

The Times’ achievement is no big deal. It’s what we’d expect from any news organization striving for fairness in reporting.

Too bad the Detroit Free Press, which broke the text message story in January, can’t meet the standard.

The nut of the story is that Detroit 36th District Judge Ronald Giles has decided to withhold some text messages that have not already been published by the Free Press and umpteen other news outlets because, as the Times writes, they “could be challenged by the defense as privileged material or would be ruled inadmissible.”

Why might the unpublished messages be privileged or inadmissible?

Again according to the Times, “Defense lawyers say the messages could threaten the defendants’ ability to get a fair trial and were illegally obtained.”

Nowhere in the Free Press story will you read that explanation.

The Detroit paper consumes a large tract of page 3A newsprint real estate with a big color photo of Beatty and hizzoner over a fat, two-deck headline: “Judge: Some texts could stay private.”

Does the Free Press report say the messages would stay private because, as the Times concisely put it, they might impair the ability of Beatty and Kilpatrick to get a fair trial and besides were gotten illegally?

Nope.

Who got the messages illegally?

We don’t know the answer to that one. But we do know, because the Free Press trumpets the news every chance it gets, including in this story, that the Free Press obtained and published parts of messages that came — apparently illegally — from Beatty’s city-issued pager.

It’s a violation of federal law for a pager company to release text messages, but SkyTel, the city’s pager company, did just that.

The Times said it plainly. The Free Press broke the story in January and supposedly owns the story. So why did they miss these points?

I doubt it was an oversight.

First, there’s the issue of making sure Beatty and Kilpatrick get a fair trial. The Free Press has already told us what it thinks: Guilty as charged.

In a previous post, I chided Free Press editors for saying over and over in stories that the text messages “show” that Beatty and Kilpatrick committed perjury in a police whistle-blower lawsuit. But Beatty and Kilpatrick have yet even to be bound over for trial, a circus that won’t happen till next year, if ever. In other words, no jury has yet determined that the text messages “show” anything.

Despite my efforts to correct them, the hanging judges at the Free Press keep acting like this duo have been convicted. In the July 15 paper, they repeated the falsehood: The text messages, the Free Press stated, “showed Kilpatrick and Beatty…lied under oath and tried to mislead jurors in a whistle-blower trial.”

Talk about tainting potential jurors. Many who read the Free Press could easily come to believe, if they don’t think very carefully, that Beatty and Kilpatrick have already been assigned state prison inmate numbers.

Because I hear Freepsters and other Detroit journalists saying the Free Press is a shoo-in for a Pulitzer Prize for its Kwamegate coverage, I’m convinced that the paper’s staff are tilting their stories to impress the prize board judges. Journalism awards often are given out to publications whose stories get results. Putting somebody in jail is a very visible result. At the Free Press, it seems that they want so badly for Kilpatrick to do jail time that in their minds he’s already taken the fall.

Okay, that explains maybe why the paper pretends the mayor and Beatty are guilty until proven innocent. But why would the newspaper suppress basic facts of court coverage like the issue of the possibly illegal release of text messages to someone who knew how to get them published?Just as self-interest in the form of Pulitzer mania seems to be driving coverage, so is it being pushed by the paper’s need to protect itself and its employees from parts of the story the Free Press has chosen not to tell us.

Namely, who gave them the illicit text messages? How did they get this big scoop, anyway?

Isn’t this fascinating? I’d like to know. Lawyers for Kilpatrick and Beatty seem dazzled by this question, too. They’re demanding to have the two star Free Press reporters who broke the story testify in the newspaper’s own Freedom of information Act lawsuit demanding that all the text messages be made public. If the paper wins that one, gets lots more messages out in the open, it would be a big coup — then they can pick and choose which will be the next juicy morsels they print.

Right now, they’re not in control of the information flow that creates the story. That’s one reason why Free Press editors and lawyers don’t want the reporters to testify. Another reason might be, well, if somebody at the paper crossed an ethical or legal line. That would be a story to choke on.

The paper’s making a First Amendment issue of its claim that the reporters should not have to testify. They say it’s in the public interest that the text messages be released in full, but it’s not in the public interest for their reporters to tell all.

Wouldn’t it be in the public interest for the reporters to tell the whole story? How can you can defend freedom of expression by suppressing the truth?

I’m sure it galls bosses at the Free Press to think Kwame might take charge of this story.

The Free Press is so entangled in Kwamegate that it can’t fairly report the story.

Contact me at joelthurtell(at)gmail.com

Posted in Joel's J School, Kwamegate | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments