>Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2000 17:24:29 -0500 (CDT)
>From: Project Censored <censored@sonoma.edu>
>Subject: Censored Alert: rBGH Fox News Trial
>
>For immediate release
>July 14, 2000
>
>Ralph Nader, Walter Cronkite On Witness List
>Fired Journalists Stand Up To Media Empire;
>Whistleblower Case Is First Of Its Kind
>
> While an increasing number of Americans suspect mainstream news
>organizations sometimes twist the news, two veteran investigative
>journalists say they are ready to prove in court how Fox television
>managers and lawyers at WTVT Fox 13 in Tampa ordered them to deliberately
>distort news reports and then fired them for resisting those directives.
>
> The landmark whistleblower lawsuit is believed to be the first time
>any journalist has ever filed a claim against his own news organization
>and offered evidence of behind-the-scenes manipulation of the news.
>
> When the trial begins next Monday, reporters Jane Akre (pronounced
>A'-cree) and Steve Wilson say they will show exactly how Fox hired them
>and advertised their reputations for hard-hitting investigations but then
>folded and pressured them to slant a story in favor of an advertiser who
>threatened "dire consequences" if their reports were broadcast.
>
> CBS journalist Walter Cronkite and public interest advocate Ralph
>Nader are both on the plaintiffs' witness list, despite efforts by Fox
>attorneys who desperately sought to block their testimony.
>
> The trial will pit the two fired journalists with Wilson representing
>himself for more than two years in an effort to save money on legal fees,
>and Akre represented by a small Tampa firm,against the powerful Washington
>law firm of Williams & Connolly, the same lawyers who represent President
>Bill Clinton personally. To get their day in court, the plaintiffs have
>sold their home, spent their life savings battling the media giant, and
>say they have been branded as media traitors never likely to get another
>good job in the business again.
>
> To the amazement of most legal observers, the reporters paved their
>way to court by defeating three Fox motions to summarily dismiss the case
>without a trial. Those victories were engineered by Akre's legal team led
>by John Chamblee and Tom Johnson.
>
> At the heart of the dispute is a series of reports produced by Akre
>and Wilson revealing the widespread and virtually secret use of a
>synthetic hormone being injected into dairy cows throughout Florida and
>much of the U.S. The hormone causes cows to produce more milk.
>
> The investigative reports that Fox abruptly pulled from its schedule
>in early 1997 would have revealed that without the consent or approval of
>milk drinkers and those who serve it daily to their children, use of the
>synthetic hormone has altered what used to be called nature's most nearly
>perfect food.
>
> The stories would have also disclosed for the first time that leading
>grocers now admit they quietly broke their 1994 promises not to buy milk
>from hormone-injected cows until the practice achieved widespread
>acceptance. Surveys have shown that the vast majority of consumers do
>not want artificial hormones in their milk and would avoid such milk if it
>were labeled. No dairy anywhere is known to label its milk as coming from
>cows injected with artificial hormones.
>
> Although legal in America, the artificial bovine growth hormone (rBGH)
>has been banned in Canada, throughout Europe, and elsewhere due in large
>part to concern about health risks for milk drinkers. One of the chief
>concerns is that while the growth hormones do cause the cows to produce
>more milk, the milk is changed in a way that could promote breast, colon
>and prostate cancer.
>
> "In wake of the two written threats1,2 from Monsanto to Fox News
>chief Roger Ailes, we were asked to put Fox's interest in its own bottom
>line ahead of the public interest," said plaintiff Steve Wilson. Monsanto
>is the multi-national chemical company that makes the genetically
>engineered hormone.
>
> "When the president of Fox Television Stations saw those threats,
>that executive who controls more television stations than anyone in
>America simply ordered his lawyers to 'take no risks' with the story."
>Wilson said. The executive's directive has been confirmed in sworn
>testimony from two Fox attorneys3,4 in the written notes of one them.5
>
> "And we have also discovered, in another handwritten note of one of
>the broadcaster's attorneys, that if they tried to kill the story and word
>leaked out, it would be a major p-r problem for Fox'" said co-plaintiff
>Akre. "So they decided to eliminate their risk by pressuring us to
>placate Monsanto and essentially lie to the public. No decent journalist
>can ever do that."
>
> The reporters will testify that Fox managers first threatened to fire
>them for insubordination, then offered them a six-figure deal to entice
>them to go along. When the pair refused, they say they were strung along
>for months re-writing the story 83 times in an effort to get it on the air
>before being suspended, locked out, and ultimately fired by Fox for what
>the broadcasting company claimed was "no cause."
>
> The reporters will not be able to tell the jury about a second deal
>Fox offered to pay each reporter a whole year's salary for no-show jobs as
>"news consultants" in exchange for their leaving quietly and never
>disclosing to anyone what they learned regarding the milk or the quality
>of Fox journalism. The trial court ruled that the second six-figure deal
>was actually made to try and avoid a lawsuit. To encourage out-of-court
>settlements, such offers cannot be admitted into evidence when disputes
>cannot be settled without a trial.
>
> The issue has drawn world-wide attention as a result of a website the
>journalists posted the day their lawsuit was filed. The reporters, who
>happen to be married to each other, have also traveled far and wide to
>accept invitations to speak about genetically engineered milk and their
>experiences with Fox. They have vowed not to personally benefit from
>their efforts to publicize the story Fox refused to tell.
>
> Many of the documents from the suit are posted on the World Wide Web
>at
>http://www.foxBGHsuit.com
>
>For further information or to arrange interviews:
>
>Jane Akre or Steve Wilson (727) 796-6504 or wilson@citicom.com
>John Chamblee or Tom Johnson, Akre's Attorneys (813) 251-4542
>
>###
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------
>Greg Ruggiero | Seven Stories Press | www.sevenstories.com
>--------------------------------------------------------------
>
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