A Small Look Into The History of Journalistic Fraud And The Media Business

Journalism by design is an imperfect trade.

That trait leaves the trade open to many unsavory elements. Those elements can range from sources feeding misinformation to a journalist working on a story to what is the cardinal sins of the trade, plaigarism and fabrication of articles for parsonal gain. The acts of plagiarism and fabrication can and have caused the public to look at journalists with a wary eye.

In American journalism there are three intances where either plagiarism, fabrication, or both have occurred and are likely part of lesson plans in Journalism classes throughout the country. I know that my old journalism professor has covered two of these events in class. Here are a brief look into these instances in chronological order.

1.) Janet Cooke & 'Jimmy's World'  (Article printed on the September 28, 1980 edition of The Washington Post)

As the late 1970s were coming to an end a heroin epidemic was ravaging urban America, particularly in minority neighborhoods. In was this type of enviroment in Washington, D.C. where Cooke wrote an article about an eight-year-old maned Jimmy.

Jimmy was a third generation heroin addict who got hooked on the drug when he was five thanks to his mother's live-in boyfriend. Despite what his family was going through Jimmy wanted to become a drug dealer when he grew up.

Cooke looked like she had a touching and hertbreaking feature story. It also looked like The Washington Post, still riding high from them breaking the news of the Watergate break-in, had another hit on their hands. There was only one problem though.

Jimmy didn't actually exist.

Shortly after the article was published, readers of the Post wanted to know Jimmy's whereabouts to help the boy and his family. The Washington, D.C. city government, led by then-mayor Marion Berry, also launched a manhunt to find the boy. Cooke intially said that she couldn't reveal Jimmy's whereabouts due to a need to protect her sources and to protect her life from drug dealers.

Soon after the city's manhunt for Jimmy proved unsuccessful speculation swirled around Washington, D.C. that Jimmy might not be real. The Post stood by Cooke and the story, going so far as to nominating the article for a Pulitzer prize. Things started to fall apart though as Cooke's former employer, The Toledo Blade, noticed discrepancies in Cooke's biographical notes in her Pulitzer nomination. They contacted the Post and an internal investigtion was launched that discovered fabrications in the academic credentials Cooke listed on her resume. While this was happening the worst possibble thing happened to the Post.

'Jimmy's World' won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for feature writing.

In light of this and now armed with the proof of the fabricated academic credentials, Post editors confronted Cooke and demanded to know Jimmy's whereabouts. That is when Cooke confessed that the story was a fabrication. Two days after winning the Pulitzer, the Post held a news conference and admitted the truth about Cooke's article. Then, after enjoying the high praise of breaking the Watergate scandal, the Post had to endure the shame of returning the Pulitzer.

Cooke resigned from the Post and for the most part disappeared from public life except for an appearance on The Phil Donahue Show in 1982 and an interview in GQ magazine in 1996.

--------------------

2.) Stephen Glass & The New Republic (Articles in question published from 1995 through 1998)

Glass was hired by The New Republic in 1995 after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania where he was the excutive editor of the student newspaper. The biggest event during Glass's tenure in the newspaper was the infamous 'Water Buffalo' incident where White students shouted racial epithets at Black students.

TNR at the time was hailed as a political magazine with much integrity. It even went went as far as calling itself "The in-flight magazine of Air Force One."

Glass quickly moved from being an assistant to being a feature writer. His writing style was described as humorous and that led to him writing articles for other magazine publications such as Policy Review, George, Rolling Stone, and Harper's. Glass enjoyed loyalty from his co-workers at TNR, but that loyalty started being chipped away as claims of plagiarism in Glass's articles began to rise up.

In December of 1996 the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) took issue with a Glass article titled 'Hazardous to Your Mental Health' in which they were the target. The CSPI put out a press release citing the various inaccuracies the article had and hinted at possible plagiarism in a letter they wrote to editors in TNR. Then in March 1997 the anti-drug organization Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) levied similar accusations about a Glass article titled 'Don't You D.A.R.E.'. Then in May 1997 the College National Republican Committee wrote a letter to TNR editor stating that the Glass article titled 'Spring Breakdown' telling tales of debauchery happening at the 1997 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was a fabrication. Then in June 1997 Hofstra University officials wrote a letter to TNR editors citing errors in a Glass article titled 'Peddling Poppy.'

Out of those accusations, it was those levied against 'Spring Breakdown' that were the most potent. One particular issue that rose up from the article was that Glass wrote about small liquor bottles coming from a mini refrigertor in the hotel room where the article took place. The hotel told TNR editors that they don't have any mini refrigerators in their rooms after the accusations were levied. Despite these accusations TNR stood behind Glass and his work.

Then came the straw that broke the camel's back, a May 18, 1998 Glass article titled 'Hack Heaven.'

In the article Glass wrote about a teenager dubbed 'Big Bad Bionic Boy' who hacked into the website of a company called Jukt Micronics and posted the salary of the company's employees in the website's front page along with nude photos. Glass's story also told of a meeting between the teenage boy, the boy's agent, and Jukt Micronics executives where the company hired the boy as a security consultant along with it being shaken down by the boy for items such as a car and adult magazine subscriptions. In the end the story told how the boy emerged victorious inside a convention for hackers and how state legislatures were writing laws to prevent deals like the one in the article.

The story looked like another hit for TNR, but it soon began falling apart. When the article landed on the desk of Forbes Digital Tool reporter Adam Penenberg, he wanted to do a follow-up article to see how he got scooped. Forbes Digital Tool at the time was the internet arm of Forbes magazine where Penenberg worked the hacking front. As Penenberg dug into 'Hack Heaven' he slowly realized that the article was a complete fabrication. Armed with their findings Penenberg and FDT editors confronted Glass and his TNR editor Charles Lane about the article in a scheduled conference call. Glass then tried to sell the idea that he was just duped to Lane.

Glass though, realizing he got caught and knowing that Lane was now on his trail, began doing everything possible to cover up his journalistic crime. He made fake business cards for the 'agent' along with a fake hacker newsletter. He provided fabricated notes to Lane. He created a crudely made fake website for Jukt Micronics that was only accesible to America Online members prior to the conference call. He even set up fake phone numbers with voicemails and had his brother pose as a Jukt Micronics executive.

As Lane looked deeper into 'Hack Heaven' the more he found out that the article was in fact a fabrication. One key part of this was when Lane discovered that the building where the supposed hacker conference happened was closed on the day Glass wrote it occured. The last evidence Lane found was the discovery that Glass's brother was posing as an executive. Uopn this discovery Lane fired Glass.

TNR editors wrote a letter of apology to its readers about Glass. Then they looked into Glass's articles after his firing and initially concluded that 27 of the 41 articles he wrote were either partially or completely fabricated.

Glass has stayed out of the spotlight until 2003 when he wrote an autobiographical, yet fictional book titled 'The Fabulist.' Then he did various television interviews as a movie depicting his time at TNR titled 'Shattered Glass' was coming out. That same year he wrote an article for Rolling Stone about Canadian marijuana laws. He has been trying to obtain a license to practice law in California since 2007, but was rejected due to his fabrications. Upon his appeal the count of fabricated articles Glass wrote for TNR and the other publications mentioned has risen to 42, 36 of those coming from TNR.

Lane now covers the Supreme Court for The Washington Post.

--------------------

Jayson Blair & The New York Times (Articles in question published from 1999 through 2003)

Blair's tenure with the New York Times was rocky from the beginning. After serving as editor-in-chief of his college newspaper in 1997 where complaints of inaccuracies in his reporting arose, but were never follwed up, Blair got a summer internship for NYT in 1998. After finishing the internship Blair returned to NYT in January 1999 as people assumed he finished his college courses and graduated. He in fact at that time still had a year's worth of courses to complete in order to graduate.

Blair's behavior and profesionalism since he started working full-time for NYT were questioned by fellow reporters. This reached a boiling point in April 2002 when Jonathan Landman, at the time NYT's metropolitan section editor, fired off an e-mail to fellow editors and administrators simply stating ''We have to stop Jayson from writing for the Times. Right now."

After this Blair was warned both verbally and in writing by NYT that his job was on the line. He responded by taking a leave of absence. Shortly after his return NYT editors felt that his work had inproved. In October 2002, after thinking that he turned his life around, NYT editors moved Blair to the National section. Blair was assigned work such as the Washington, D.C. sniper case along with covering stories of soldiers dealing with coming back from Afghanistan. This where his most serious misdeeds occured.

Things started to fall apart for Blair on April 28, 2003 when he received a phone call from his editor Jim Roberts. The phone call centered around concerns raised by the senior editor of the San Antonio Express-News of similarities between a Blair article written two days earlier and one written by an Express-News reporter named Macarena Hernandez on April 18. Hernandez worked alongside Blair when she was completing a summer internship at NYT.

An inquiry was launched following this and Blair was exposed. Several Blair articles were found to be complete fabrications. Others Blair articles were found to have accounts of true events that were plagiarized from other news wire services and newspapers.

Upon this finding NYT wrote a 7,239-word mea culpa in its May 11, 2003 front page calling the incidents a low point in the newspaper's history.

Blair resigned from NYT following that mea culpa but didn't stay out of the spotlight for long. In 2004 he wrote a book titled 'Burning Down My Masters' House: My life at the New York Times' along with making various television appearances promoting the book. He has since went back to college and become a life coach.

--------------------

These three incidents had a shockwave effect when they happened that in some ways was short-term and at the same time are having lingering effects to this day.

Cooke's misdeeds cast a dark cloud over an entire generation of African-American journalists. TNR, at the time still recovering from a similar episode involving reporter Ruth Shalit, found their reputation damaged thanks to Glass and it may have never recovered. The same can be said of NYT due to the nature of the articles Blair wrote along with many felt was their pushing for the Iraq War. Blair's incident was also used as a point of attack for opponents of affirmative action.

What is also amazing is each of these transgressors has actually tried to profit from their journalistic crimes. After her GQ interview Cooke was said to have sold the movie rights to her story for over $1 million, yet no such movie has been made so far. Glass waited five years to come out with 'The Fabulist.' Blair barely waited a year for his book.

People can rightfully ask why these events happened in the first place and how the warning signs were missed. One major answer to these questions is that for a long time now newspapers and other media outlets have been owned by entities that are not media-oriented at all. Those entities have chosen to run media outlets like businesses where profit is king. If print media outlets are run like businesses they will not look into possible trangressions of popular or up-&-coming writers until it is too late. The reverse is also true that print media outlets can jump the gun too early if it feels like the bottom line might be hurt.

There is in fact a recent case of such an incident.

In early June James 'Jimmy Henchman' Rosemond was found guilty of 13 counts in a Brooklyn federal court ranging from drug trafficking to weapons trafficking in a crack cocaine ring that went from New York City to Los Angeles. Rosemond also ran a management company called Czar Entertainment that features clients such as Los Angeles rapper The Game.

Rosemond is facing a life sentence due to these convictions. He still has to face trial for setting up the murder of a man that slapped his son.

On June 12 a Village Voice online article revealed that court transcripts show Rosemond admitting in a 'Queen For a Day' proffer session with the federal government last autumn that he set up the late Tupac Shakur in the infamous 1994 shooting at New York City's Quad recording studios. A proffer session is a time where a defendant agrees to reveal knowledge of prior crimes to the government on the condition that the knowledge can't be used to prosecute them. Rosemond used nine of these sessions as a means to receive a lighter sentence if convicted.

Rosemond admitted his involvement in the Quad shooting shortly after a former long-time associate, Dexter Isaac, himself admitted in a statement to the website AllHipHop.com that he robbed Shakur after being paid $2,500 dollars by Rosemond. Isaac is already serving life in prison for other crimes.

These two admissions solve the mystery of the Quad shooting which is regarded as the spark that ignited the East Coast-West Coast Rap War. This event, while making millions for the music industry, ultimately is seen as responsible for the violent deaths of both Shakur and his primary rival The Notorious B.I.G. aka. Biggie Smalls. Rosemond's role in the Quad shooting has long been the subject of Hip-Hop legend. Shakur himself named Rosemond as the man behind the incident in a song titled 'Against All Odds' since he was going to Quad Studios to record a song with a rapper that Rosemond managed on the night of the shooting.

Rosemond's admission not only puts to rest any spelulation about the Quad shooting, but it also vindicates a journalist whose investigative reporting of the event made him a target for Rosemond, his lawyers, and associates to defame for over four years.

That journalist is Chuck Phillips.

Phillips is a heralded journalist who has covered the entertainmant industry for over 20 years. He has won a 1999 Pulitzer Prize along with fellow journalist Michael Hiltzik for their work uncovering corruption in the entertainment industry. He is also responsible for breaking the news that Milli Vanilli were just a lip-sync act.

Phillips' most well known work though has been his reporting on the Hip-Hop industry. He took particular interest in the murders of Tupac and Biggie. He has stated that his digging into these events seemed to always lead him to the Quad shooting and that ultimately led him to investigate it.  Phillips spent months going to his street sources for information. They led him to prisons where some of the people suspected by the streets of ambushing Shakur at the Quad were serving time. Two of the men Phillips talked to in prison not only admitted to the Quad shooting, but also said that they were hired by Rosemond to ambush and rob Shakur. Phillips, like other journalists covering Hip-Hop, had long heard the legends that the Quad shooting was the work of Rosemond. Upon finishing his investigation Phillips was told by a jailhouse source named Jimmy Sabatino that there were FBI-302 reports filed in a Florida court case that could back up his findings. Phillips obtained the 302s and faxed them to Rosemond's lawyer in order to get a response from their camp three weeks before the article was published. While Phillips didn't intend to have the 302s attached to the article, his editor and lawyers at the Los Angeles Times decided to include them. Journalists and editors are trained to look for strong ducumented evidence to back up their findings. Of this type of evidence, court documents are commonly seen as the gold standard.

On March 17, 2008 Phillips' article titled 'An Attack on Tupac Shakur Launched a Hip-Hop War' was published on LAT's website with the 302s included. On March 26 the 302s were revealed as forgeries by the website TheSmokingGun.com. Phillips offered to write a follow up piece to the article apologizing for being duped on the 302s. He was met with resistance at first from his superiors until the reaction came in.

Once the 302s were found to be fakes Rosemond and his lawyer pounced. Publicly, Rosemond called the article slanderous and accused Phillips of fabricating documents to defame him. Rosemond and his lawyer also went on the internet front and lauched a smear campaign urging LAT to fire Phillips. Privately, Rosemond's lawyer was threatening LAT with litigation.

On March 27 LAT had the follow up piece with the apology about the 302s was published. It didn't stop Rosemond though. He cleverly spinned the apology for the documents into an exonoration of any involvement he had of the Quad shooting. His lawyer still threatened LAT with litigation privately. Phillips urged his superiors to call Rosemond's bluff and take him to court as they had Rosemond's criminal record and a strong California law protecting journalists in mistakes like this on their side.

The LAT instead chose to buckle under to Rosemond's threats. on April 7 they issued a retraction that made Phillips look like a plagiarist and after allowing Rosemond's smear campaign to keep rolling for years fired Phillips in June 2010 after assuring that his job wasn't on the line. The firing was part of an out-of-court settlement reached between Rosemond and LAT that totaled $250,000. Rosemond announced Phillips' firing on his website before it was even official and boasted about walking away with $500,000 and Phillips' head, thereby declaring himself exonirated.

Rosemond didn't end his smear campaign after this. He leaked a fabricated $120 million lawsuit to the media soon after Phillips left LAT claiming that Phillips was trying to defame him again. The evidence Rosemond pointed to this time was a September 2010 article by the New York Daily News citing official records from Rosemond's own criminal trials that showed he was a federal informant. Rosemund's lawyer initially called the article a witch hunt being done by the government but then went back to to their old trick, blaming Phillips. Soon a website called hiphopconspiracy.com suddenly popped with more smears aimed at Phillips that included a fabricated $100 million libel suit by Rosemond.

Then on May 2011 the DEA had an arrest warrant issued for Rosemond on charges of drug and weapons trafficking. He tried to blame his problems on Phillips and the government while he went on the lam. On June 21 Rosemond was caught after a foot chase near Union Square. Soon his associates followed suit by also being arrested on these charges. It was during the trial for these crimes that Rosemond was indicted for murder.

Now as this case comes full circle a sense a sense of poetic justice can be felt as it was Phillips himself that broke the news of Rosemond's admission to setting up Shakur at Quad Studios that night. it wasn't easy though.

Phillips flew from California to Brooklyn to cover the trial only to have Rosemond's new lawyer (the old one was disqualified from representing him due to conflict of interest) attempt to throw him out of the courtroom by subpoenaing him as a defense witness. The lawyer then went on to blame Phillips' article for his current troubles. Not only did the prosecution then bring up the proffer sessions that contradicted what Rosemond's lawyer was saying in a sidebar discussion, but they also submitted Phillips's article as part of their evidence.

While this admission vindicates Phillips' work it doesn't wipe away the damage his career has suffered overnight, not will it convince Rosemond's most loyal fans that they were bamboozled. Rosemond's smear campaign along with LAT's cowardice have rendered Phillips unemployable for over four years.

A curious part about this whole incident is that legally Rosemond has nothing to worry about. When the Quad Studio shooting occured the New York City Police Department classified the incident as a robbery. Robberies have only a seven-year statute of limitations in New York State. That means Rosemond and his associates have been legally in the clear since late 2001.

The most damning part of this incident is how LAT handled the situation. Rather that back up a reporter they knew was solid, they only at their bottom line (their parent company was in the red, same as they).

They didn't look at the situation like a newspaper publication, they looked at it like a business and it's still trying to save face.

As news media has become more corporate it has allowed all these incidents to happen. A balance has to be struck soon. Not doing so will allow cold-hearted ambition to produce more Janet Cookes, Stephen Glasses, and Jayson Blairs while fear of profit margins will allow more Chuck Phillips' to occur.

We can only hope that this does change soon.