I saw this tonight as I was watching news unfold about gay marriage in New York:
Three reporters?! We didn’t have that many reporters to put on the unfolding disappearance and murder that happened a few weeks ago. We only have four reporters, plus one photographer. Three reporters to cover one meeting — that’s luxury!
Makes you wonder how print can survive…
I have three episodes of reporting I’m particularly proud of since I’ve been at the Conway Daily Sun, and all of them center on the police.
The first was a story I did right before town meeting on the department’s end of year spending habits. Several years ago the department blew through tens of thousands of dollars in the final days of the year. The next year it was a similar story, although less pronounced, to the point they had less than $50 to give back to the town. Finding and pointing out that pattern was exhilarating. When I was staring at their expenses and realized what had happened I almost started bouncing.
The second one was durring Krista Dittmeyer’s disappearance. Through random connections and some luck I found the name of her baby’s father. Then with a bit more digging I found out he was in prison in Maine. That afternoon I was at a press conference with national media where reporters in calf-length jackets and hipster glasses grilled the local lieutenant about the case. They kept asking about the father, but the lieutenant wouldn’t budge. The Sun photographer there with me had to remind me to wipe away the smirk. I knew I knew something no one else did. We wound up beating every other news outlet with that story, including the Portland Press Herald, a much bigger paper based in the town Dittmeyer lived in.
And yesterday the third story came out.
This story was about a theft within the police department, a theft that happened months ago that no one has been talking about. I was able to get the police chief, the police commissioners and the State Police to talk about the incident, and I was able to get a number of the key details out.
When you feel a story like these start to come together it feels really good. It feels like you’ve just discovered a lost civilization, one people meant for you never to find. It’s a treasure hunt, and with these ones I found the prize. There are surely more prizes out there, however. I’m happy to keep digging.
I finished a big story about a theft within the Conway Police Department today, a theft officials said had to have been committed by an employee.
Within days of the theft, a longtime officer resigned. I was writing the story several days ago, going around and around trying to avoid mentioning his resignation and its awkward timing. I didn’t want to implicate the officer by bringing up his name. After discussing it in the office, however, the rest of the staff and I decided we couldn’t leave him out. It’s not fair to connect him to the story, but at the same time it’s not possible to ignore the difficult questions.
Today I called the former officer and asked if there was a connection between his resignation and the theft. He said no. He also said he would prefer if I didn’t mention him in the story. I told him I couldn’t do leave him out, simply because of the close proximity of the timing. This is a small enough town that people would point out the less than thorough reporting if I left him out. I have to address it, I told the former officer, and I will do my best to not turn the question into an implication.
It’s not fun to have to balance someone’s reputation with the public’s right to know. Hopefully I was able to balance that well. We’ll see what people say tomorrow.
We are going to have GOP contender Ron Paul in the office next week, on Friday morning. As usual the complete interview will go up that night or the following day. Just a heads up. Here is his announcement:
A colleague asked me the other day how I was able to get in touch with a man who until the day before was in jail pending assault charges for a hatchet attack.
Funny story…
Not really, but it is interesting to note how much information is available out there on social networking sites, and how much it of a help it can be for reporting.
Like this: people were defending a man accused of murder on the Conway Daily Sun Facebook page, so I shot several of them a message with my work phone number. One of them got back to me, and I interviewed her about the man’s character.
Then a couple weeks later there was this hatchet attack. The same woman was listed in court documents as living with the accused. So I called her up. She talked to me briefly, but when the man got out of jail on bail she had him call me.
He then said he was threatened and called racial slurs prior to the attack (the man is black). I looked at the MySpace page of one of the men involved, and his last name on that page was “Reich.” He was also fans of skinhead neo-Nazi bands. It lent some credence to the man’s story, and it sparked an interesting conversation with the police about whether they would charges coming out for anyone else in the incident.
I have also used Facebook to link people, such as relatives of the man who fathered Krista Dittmeyer’s daughter. It’s amazing what is available online. Reporters don’t have a lot of rules, and they have to use everything at their disposal to get the story. Facebook and other social media have proven to be one hell of a tool.
I got to break bad news to two dads today: their sons names were going in the paper, and they aren’t going to look too good afterward.
One got hit in the head with a hatchet trying to retrieve a $5 hat. The other is accused of assaulting and robbing his girlfriend and assaulting two other people.
One son is 18, the other is 17. Both dads called today to see what they could do to smooth over what showed up in the paper. Neither man was pushy — they both were following their parental instincts, trying to protect their boys. And I had to tell them I understand the position they are in, but there isn’t much I can do.
In the hatchet incident, there were threats and racial slurs reportedly flying around, and the son and another man pulled into this guys driveway and pulled a knife. The man who’s house it was pulled out a hatchet, and someone got hurt. I asked the dad what he would do if someone was threatening him and then two men showed up at his house? Would he maybe grab a weapon? Yes, he conceded, he might have grabbed a hatchet.
From that point on things were destined to go downhill.
The other man wanted to make a point that his son wasn’t a bad guy. He offered to talk to me, but I told him since he wasn’t there he’d just be a character witness, and not a particularly convincing one since he is obviously biased. I told him I’d be happy to interview his son to get his side of things, but I couldn’t imagine his attorney would recommend it.
It was interesting to field both those calls today. Happy Father’s Day, I guess. Please don’t get arrested; you’re father will appreciate it.
I’m heading down to Manchester next week to cover the first New Hampshire GOP presidential-hopeful debate. To be fair there was an earlier debate between GOP hopefuls, but most of the big names were missing. They all won’t be at this one (Palin and Giuliani come to mind) but Gingrich, Bachmann and Romney will all be there, among others. I’m working out a plan to live-blog it, although I’m not sure just exactly how or for whom yet. It’s a work in progress. But I will definitely be writing something up for the Conway Daily Sun. I figured as long as I’m on the presidential theme I might as well keep rolling.
Mitt Romney called me at work today to talk about his announcement that he is running for president in 2011. I was mentioning the call to someone this afternoon, and the word that came up was “plastic.”
Other’s have put it more gently: Mitt Romney looks every bit the presidential candidate. But what that means is his hair is always perfect, he’s always smiling, he’s tall, dark and handsome.
In other words, he’s a slightly graying Ken doll, with a conservative slant.
When Giuliani stopped by two of the people in the office noticed he didn’t look anyone in the eye when he shook our hands. I was too busy futzing with my video camera, so I can’t say I noticed, but they were sure. It’s interesting to get to meet these people one-on-one, and to interact with them. It’s the beauty of being in New Hampshire.
Several of the people who have been there through several of these cycles talk about how the most successful candidates have charisma, star power. Jon Stewart was talking about it recently when he was on Bill O’Reilly’s program. Bill Clinton, he said, lit up the room. Sarah Palin does the same thing.
Thus far I’ve met Newt, Rudy and Gary Johnson (you don’t know him) and talked with Mitt. If I had to choose based on charisma, I’d go with Mitt.
But he doesn’t have it all. It comes back to being plastic. Mitt has earned a reputation similar to John Kerry, that of a flip-flopper. He laid out excellent rational about why supporting state health care reform similar to Obama’s national health care reform was acceptable today, and he made it clear he would scrap the national plan as soon as he makes it to the White House, but in many conservatives’ eyes he’s too late. He’s switched positions enough to have lost their confidence.
I don’t have a Republican candidate who seems genuine. Mike Huckabee would have been a good example, but he’s opted not to run. Gary Johnson was very genuine, but I don’t see him getting very far. John Huntsman the same thing.
Honestly, I think Palin is the best combination of charisma and authenticity the GOP can offer this year, but I can’t see her winning the general election. Between not knowing her magazine titles and not finishing her gubernatorial term, she just doesn’t seem to have what it takes to lead the country. Besides, she is a Tea Party favorite, but many moderate voters are scared of her. Had she finished out her term in Alaska she would have had a much better shot at 2012, but people need some time to forget that history for her to succeed.
So who’s left? I’m not really sure. No one promising yet, but it’s a long way from November. We’ll see where we end up in 2012.
Part one of the full Rudy Giuliani interview:
Part two:
It has been a short week this week, because of the Memorial Day holiday, but it has again been crazy. A man struck another man in the head with a hatchet, there was a drug bust in Conway at the same time as someone in the house was overdosing on antidepressants, there was an attempted abduction of a 14-year-old girl, tornado warnings north of the notches, and former mayor Rudy Giuliani stopped by the office to say hello.
Here’s a brief clip of his visit:
It’s been interesting over the last two months — I’ve become almost a full time crime reporter. I’ve talked to the Department of Corrections spokesman at least once a week, sometimes a couple times a day (like today and yesterday), and I’m sinking my teeth into the law almost every day. Child endangerment? Sure. Felonious sexual assault? Why not. I’ve been seeing more and more of this stuff as the weather warms. I’m interested to see just how hot the summer gets. I’m not sure people want to see much more of this.
On the good side, however, I had no fewer than four cover stories today. I’m not really sure how that works, I crowded out everyone else. The good thing is we have two reporters gone on vacation. There’s been no shortage of things to fill the paper with while they’re gone!
ErikEisele.com 