Few people are surprised anymore when they hear about accounts of press bias in newspaper and television reports. Readers are often, and rightly, skeptical of what they read and hear; is there a selective, distorted reporting of a story? There are still serious journalists in America, but seemingly fewer than in the past. Fewer in Whitewater, certainly: Carrie Dampier’s headline story on Star Packaging in the September 6th Whitewater Register reads like bias of a third-rate, homegrown variety. In a story entitled, “Former Star Packaging Employees Charged with Identity Theft,” Dampier reveals herself to be less than a middling reporter, let alone a supposed ‘editor.’ It’s a sad joke of a news story, so egregious in its omissions that it reads as though were written as a parody of egregious bias.
(For a quick recap of Dampier’s previous bias, see my post critiquing her saccharine coverage of May’s Police Day, that the Register entitled — get this, objective journalists everywhere — “What Would We Ever Do Without Them?”)
What junior-league mistakes does Dampier make in the article on Star Packaging? I’ll list them for you:
1. Inadequate Sourcing. She seems to use only one source for the headline story: the criminal complaint against a Mexican defendant in the case. That’s right — it’s the lead story for the paper, and all it merits from Dampier is a clip job from the criminal complaint in the case, augmented perhaps by a scan of the court docket. That would be a laughable effort for a real reporter, let alone a supposed ‘editor’ of the paper. Dampier never indicates if she tried to call defense counsel for a statement on the case. (If she did, and received no reply, she should state so; there’s enough space to add a line to that effect.) Instead, nothing. It’s just a one-sided, quickly cribbed effort to report what the prosecution wants you to know. No one — no one — is quoted in the ‘headline’ story.
2. Omissions About the Nature of the ‘Identity Theft’ Charge. No one reading this story — without other background the story fails to provide — would know the use of identity theft charges for the Star Packaging raid is an unusual, controversial application of Wisconsin’s identity theft statutes. It is, and other real newspapers outside Whitewater have published stories by real reporters (and editors) who explained to readers that it’s an unusual application of the statute. The Week has done excellent, solid reporting on the issue. (In my post entitled, The Identity Theft Excuse, I cited some of that reporting on how odd identity theft charges are in this case, and also linked to websites of responsible police departments, describing how they investigate real cases of identity theft against consumers.) If Dampier read anything other than the Whitewater Register, she might have noticed the better reporting of other local papers on the use of identity theft charges. If she’s not looking at what other reporters are writing about these stories that she covers –as an editor! — then she’s in the wrong line of work.
3. Omissions about the Impact of the Raid. There’s nothing about how controversial the raid has been, what it did to many hard-working families, and how it destroyed an employer in Whitewater. Nothing. When the Register ran a story on the one-year anniversary protest of the raid, it ran the story on the back page of the news section. When the Register wants to run a poorly sourced story flacking the prosecution’s’ criminal complaint in connection with the raid, it’s a front-page, headline story.
4. Omissions about Larry Meyer. Here’s where Dampier writes like she’s been living in a cave (one that’s far from Whitewater). She cites from the criminal complaint about Larry Meyer’s role in the Star Packaging Raid — controversial, disgraced, defendant-in-a-federal-civil-suit Meyer — as though he were an unbiased, respected figure. Dampier omits critical information about Meyer, but I’ll do her work for her, and give you the information that she hides from the pages of her newspaper:
“Expert Witness: Investigator Led Crusade Against Businessman.” (Meyer — named defendant in a federal civil suit.)
Former Assistant District Attorney Krueger signed an affidavit that Meyer destroyed evidence in the investigation of Cvicker’s business. (Krueger subsequently left for a position with the Attorney General in Madison.)
My own posts on Meyer tell you what Dampier hides:
Burying the Story: Update on Larry Meyer.
Jim Coan and Larry Meyer’s Shameful Legacy.
Dampier’s thin, lazy headline story omits more than it tells, and has the effect of carrying water for Meyer, in a vain attempt to rehabilitate him, and his disgraceful role in the Star Packaging Raid. If Dampier took any classes in journalism, she should sue for a tuition reimbursement: the story is a hack’s job if ever there were one. Only readers who are ignorant, or already converted to a whitewash of Meyer and the police role in Star Packaging will enjoy the Register‘s latest, shabby headline story.
(In an upcoming post later this week, I’ll show how the Register is a failing paper, and how it’s no longer an effective media outlet for flacking one-sided stories for its friends.)