The story about U.S. Rep. Michael Grimm of Staten Island threatening political reporter Michael Scotto after the State of the Union Address got me thinking about the times that I was involved in threats during my 36 years at The Kansas City Star.
Interestingly (I trust), only one of them involved a threat from someone who was unhappy about my coverage of him.
In one of the other incidents, an editor threatened me.
In the third incident, I indirectly threatened to give a guy some bad publicity if he double crossed me on a personal deal we had made. (That’s the oddest of the three, but it’s worth looking at because I’m sure that it wasn’t the first time a reporter has abused the power of a journalistic position.)
Let’s take them in order…
**
Threat No. 1:
In the early 70s, when I was covering Jackson County politics, a guy named Pat Hughes was a candidate for a county legislative post. Hughes, whom I don’t think I had met until the day of the threat, had been unhappy with a story that I had written.
I don’t remember anything about the story, and I don’t remember exactly what his beef was. But I clearly remember Pat getting in my face and yelling at me. This occurred at someone’s campaign headquarters, maybe his. Like Michael Scotto, I was taken completely off guard. Hughes had me cornered and he was reaming me out about my coverage and, as I recall, threatening to beat the crap out of me.
Like the Grimm/Scotto pairing, Pat was bigger than I, and it was pretty clear that had he gone violent, I would have come out at least bloodied and bruised.
I’m pretty sure Pat was drunk, or at least had been drinking…I did the best I could to stay calm and try to bring him down to earth, just like Scotto did with Grimm. (By the way, I admired Scotto’s composure and attempt to reason with Grimm in the face of a guy gone lunatic.)
Pat Hughes
Nothing came of the Hughes-Fitzpatrick showdown, I’m happy to report. Pat quit drinking, and we became friends…Not close friends, but we lived fairly close together, and we would see each other periodically. He also apologized for the incident, saying something like, “I shit in my own mess kit.” For my part, I told him that if there had been a fight, I would have folded pretty fast.
Pat died of cancer in 2011, and, poor guy, by the time he bought the farm he was on an oxygen tank and down to about 160 pounds or less. He was a mere shadow of the big, burly guy who had scared the crap out of me that hot summer night when he was an aspiring politician and I was Jimmy Olsen.
Threat No. 2:
In the late 70s, I was working on a story involving a former Jackson County Sheriff named Kenny Carnes, who had been named Missouri public safety director by Gov. Joe Teasdale.
(Teasdale, a Kansas Citian, had gotten himself elected governor mostly by billing himself “Walkin’ Joe” in back-to-back gubernatorial bids in 1972 and 1976. Somehow, Teasdale beat then-Gov. Kit Bond in 1976, although Bond turned around and beat him in 1980).
Anyway, Carnes had done something to piss Teasdale off, and a good source named Aleck Bratt, a KC political kingmaker, told me that Teasdale was going to fire Carnes. I told my editor, Paul Haskins, what was up, and he wanted the story bad. But I wanted to get affirmation from a second source, which was and is standard procedure, before I wrote and submitted the story. Couldn’t get it anywhere, though. After a few days, Haskins called me over to his desk and, eyes narrowed, said, “Fitzpatrick, I want that story, or I’m going to hang you outside that window by your feet.”
That’s what he said. Exactly.
Paul Haskins
The newsroom was on the second floor of the Star building at 18th and Grand. The windows were very large — six or eight feet tall — and it was easy for me to envision what Paul was proposing…In addition, Paul was a high-school dropout, had yellow teeth, smoked about three packs a day, drank at night and twitched a leg continuously.
Despite the saw-toothed edges, he was an excellent editor and went on to become assistant national editor at The New York Times — before dying of smoking-related cancer in 2003.
In the face of Paul’s threat, I took the only course that a right-thinking reporter would take and that was to run with the single-source story. (I have to admit I cheated, however, and said something like, “Sources say that Gov. Teasdale is going to fire Carnes.”)
Luckily, Teasdale fired Carnes a week or so later, and I looked like a genius. (Thank you, Aleck, and God rest your soul.)
Threat No. 3:
This was in the early ’80s, during a period of a year or so when I was writing features. And remember I told you this threat did not spring from journalistic roots. Anyway, I had the bright idea to throw a sock hop at the church I was going to at the time — Visitation — and I got a commitment from an Oldies DJ — a guy named “Katfish” Kris Kelly — to provide the music.
A few days before the event, while I was at work, I called the radio station where he pulled some late-night shifts and got him on the phone, planning to finalize the details. To my shock, Kelly said he had to work at the station the night of the sock hop and wouldn’t be able to do the job.
Now, the notices had gone out for the event, and everything was set. No way we could cancel it. There was also no way I was going to let Katfish off the hook…After we talked for a couple of minutes, I asked him if his boss was around. He said he was, and I asked him to put the guy on the line. He did, and I proceeded to tell the boss how Kelly had committed to the job a month or so ago, that the event was coming up in a matter of days and that it would be almost impossible to arrange a suitable substitute.
Then, I took it up a notch…“I want you to know,” I said, “that not only am I the social chairman at Visitation, I’m also a reporter at The Star.”
There was a pause, and the boss said, “He’ll be there.”
So, Katfish worked the sock hop, and it was a huge success.
Now, what I did was not right. It was a clear abuse of my position at a powerful institution. Of course, I couldn’t and wouldn’t have written about a personal deal like that, but I surely led Kelly’s boss to believe that I would smear him in the paper.
I could have been fired for that. It was one of several things I did in my career that I could have been fired for. But I was always lucky, and, in addition, a lot of the stuff like that that happened in the 70s and 80s came before most newspapers started developing serious codes of ethics and putting the gunslinging days of journalism in the rearview mirror.
Ah, how I loved those days!
Jimbo, I took the liberty of forwarding your posting today to Bev Haskins, Paul’s ex. I’m sure she’ll get a kick out of it, as did I.
Date: Fri, 31 Jan 2014 00:52:27 +0000 To: margolies@hotmail.com
Jim:
Very interesting column. I knew Pat Hughes, as he was a long-time board member of Dismas House, a long-time agency that helps alcoholics and substance abusers get back on their feet. (Am board president.) Pat always had a raspy voice, am sure brought on by so much smoking. He was very loyal to Dismas House but eventually resigned from the board. His passing was sad.
And I remember Paul Haskins very well.
Terrible of him to threaten you like that.
Am sure nearly all of us did something that could have gotten us fired at some point. Don’t beat yourself up over that.
Enjoyed your column.
Sincerely,
Laura
Only thing really close to a physical threat that I encountered as a reporter occured while I was in the KCK Bureau in the summer of 1991. I was chasing a story about an alleged police brutality case in Armourdale. I made the mistake of going into this seedy bar to see if anybody could back the victim’s complaint. I was wearing a tie and it was here that I learned that one should never overdress for the occasion. This very fat, drunk and scary-looking guy sitting at the bar threatened to grab my tie and strangle me with it. No one there knew anything _ or so they said_ and the fat creep made me nervous enough not to want to pry further. Needless to say, I have never entered a bar in Armourdale since.
Working reporters going into bars they’ve never been in before, especially wearing ties and carrying notebooks, is definitely something you want to avoid.
I remember one time about 1970, when the managing editor of The Kansas City Times, John Chandley, sent me and Bob Dye, a reporter pal, to check out a bar on Main Street. Chandley had noticed a ton of cars parked outside, night after night, and he wondered what was going on. Instead of going in himself, he dispatched his trusty reporters.
Place was packed, and at first blush — very first blush — it looked pretty normal. We each ordered a Bud, but we hadn’t taken two sips before we realized we were getting a pretty good visual going-over from some of the patrons — and that all were men!
We took one more sip and, bam, hit the door. It was the first gay bar I’d ever seen or been to. We reported back to Mr. Chandley, who got a chuckle out our adventure.
Your threat was mild compared to the one I got from Derek Donovan a couple of years back when he had a meltdown of sorts. if memory serves, it started on his blog after several people called him on various statements he had made they claimed were false. The posts, of course, disappeared.
Somewhere in the mix Derek called me up and left a nasty message on my voicemail ( I still have the mp3 of that) and so I took it and posted it online. That led to a second phone call during which Derek told me that if I didn’t pull the mp3 he would write a nasty column about me. I sent an email to Fannin and copied Derek. Fannin blew me off and true to his word Derek wrote a nasty blog entry about me ( I still have the screen shots). That was pulled after about an hour and an “apology” was posted. Not apologizing to me mind you, but apologizing to his readers for involving them in his bit of inside baseball. That too was pulled (and again, I have the screen shots).
After that he wrote one of his editorial columns which also drew criticism from several sources. Derek came on late at night and launched into a couple of us, revealing who I was by suggestion and I think shortly after that i was blocked from commenting. (also screen shots of this)
What makes this truly pathetic is that he was supposed to be the “Reader’s Rep” and he simply does not have the personality for conflict. His approach was to give you a somewhat sympathetic ear on the first hearing, but if you pushed the issue any further, he would turn on you and become quite nasty
Since then I suspect they’ve found ways to protect him from public critique. He is now the “Public Editor”.and I’m betting most of the folks who complained were also blocked from commenting.
Since then I always get a giggle when ever The Star utters anything about its so-called ethics knowing that they don’t give a damn about ethics, particularly when it’s one of the favored few that engage in the ethical conundrums. Those are for the peons at the bottom of the totem pole, not the Chiefs.
Similar story–I wrote a comment on one of Donovan’s Diuguidish columns of irrelevancy. I criticized the topic as a non-story and wished the Star would hire a real ombudsman. Not only was the comment deleted, but my user name was banned from writing ANY comments on the Star site and he even blocked my IP address (in the event I created a new use name). The dude has some serious issues. The fight to the bottom of worthless columns between Lewis and Derek is comedy gold.
The “Non-Dynamic Duo,” should we say?
Yep, criticize Derek and your account gets banned. Apparently that was the solution to keep him from going nuts again. The question is why have someone so thin skinned in a position where you’re dealing constantly with conflict. Merit is certainly not a criteria for job selection down there. Obviously, he’s Fannin’s favorite. Fannin, the guy who had a sexual relationship with at least one of his subordinates, no wonder he didn’t see anything wrong, doesn’t he have a record for drunken brawls with his critics?
Speaking of ethics violations though, a reporter down there played in a band that wound up playing for some small time politico’s gig. Fitz, you might remember it. I don’t think it was even a political event, and they came unglued. They made him give back the money he made and made a big stink about it like they had solved any bias related problems forever.
Really, that creates an appearance of bias, but having your reporters and editorial writers go to meetings of the Mainstream Coalition as participants – as participants – when they were significant combatants in the JOCO political wars isn’t?
Playing in a band is a horrible ethical violation, but violating multiple serious journalistic standards and turning the paper into a weapon to battle against your own personal critics only changes your title from Reader’s Rep (which was an obvious lie) to Public Editor? Why even pretend?
I will add that this experience of mine (and others as well, I’m sure) absolutely debunks the notion that the Star moved to Facebook comments because “things just got out of hand”. Not sure how being dishonest with your audience gains you any credibility.
I’m glad Scotto made it public. Bullying politicians are a good story. Acquiescent reporters are bad for business.
And we have way, way too many of both. I understand that Eric Holder is coming up with new media guidelines.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2014/01/holder-new-media-guidelines-in-weeks-182277.html
Come on!! All of you reporters punch way outta your weight class!! Show some backbone!!
:)
Loved the story and the comments. I knew “Catfish” Kris Kelly pretty well and liked him too. The guy lived in a swimming pool full of blow and booze. I really liked the guy. He was pretty talented in the studio when it came to creating promotions for retail. Kinda hyper, “spitballing” for ideas could take on a whole new meaning. I wonder what ever happened to him.
:)