Reporting on religious leaders and alleged sexual misconduct creates a number of tough ethics calls for journalists. The saga of Pastor Ted Haggard of the New Life Church in Colorado is a case in point. Haggard was the senior pastor at the 14,000 member New Life Church in Colorado Springs and a top official in the National Association of Evangelicals.
That was before a male prostitute alleged that Haggard had sex with him and there was also a connection with illegal drugs. Haggard first denied the charges, then acknowledged some failings and within a few days he admitted to greater failures. As a result, Pastor Haggard lost his positions with his church and with the national organization.
KUSA-TV/9News in Denver, the NBC affiliate, was in the forefront in the coverage of Pastor Haggard's downfall.
Poynter Online asked the station's assistant news director Tim Ryan (who is also a 2006 Poynter Ethics Fellow) to respond to some questions by e-mail on how his station handled the unfolding story and scandal. Ryan and 9News executive producer Nicole Vap responded.
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BOB STEELE: Take us back to square one on this story. Why and when did 9News start reporting
on the allegations of sexual misbehavior by Pastor Ted Haggard?
TIM RYAN: The first story was at 10 p.m. (about 10:15pm in fact) on Wednesday,
Nov.
1. Our first knowledge of the story dated back to sometime in August, when Mike Jones first came to our veteran investigative reporter
Paula Woodward with his allegations. He told us he had an ongoing relationship with a man named "Art" who he eventually realized was Ted Haggard, for a number of years. He told us his sexual encounters with "Art" happened approximately every month, so he expected the next one to take place around Labor Day. He provided sex, and eventually drugs, to Art. He provided to us recordings of phone messages from "Art" and a letter postmarked Colorado Springs (which is where Haggard lives and works, although "Art" told Jones he was from Kansas City) but the phone messages alone are relatively vague, as they talk about money for "stuff." We explained to Jones that we needed more evidence to do a story and that he should contact a lawyer.
Although we remained in touch with him, we had not intended to do the story until Jones had produced more evidence, but Jones was very passionate about the upcoming election, as there are two questions on the Colorado ballot pertaining to gay rights, so he went on talk radio the morning of Nov. 1 assuming that time was running out to get the story into the public square before election day. Haggard had made no effort to contact Jones in the interim, which according to Jones was an unusually long period between encounters.
Jones did not tell us he was going to go on the radio, but in the subsequent days [he] continued to cooperate with all our journalistic efforts. Jones didn't use his own or Haggard's name during the radio appearance, but as of Nov. 1 we realized the story details were likely to become public, so the executive producer of our investigative unit, Nicole Vap, contacted Haggard for a response, and he provided us an interview on Wednesday night. Among other things, he told us that the "overseers" of the New Life Church were initiating an investigation (this was news to us). In his words: "They have the authority to fire me, discipline me or to exonerate me and so they've received a phone call already and they'll be coming in and and talking about this and investigating it and deciding what they need to do."
Also, Haggard said the church would issue a statement on Thursday. So it was clear this would be a public story the next day. We made the decision to go forward based on those reactions from the pastor
and the church.
This entire interview is
streamed at 9News.com. We did the story, naming both men for the first time, and it went from there. Hypothetically, if Haggard had told us off-camera that the allegations were unfounded and asked us to wait on the story, we would have had a different conversation. I can't say what the outcome would have been, but it would have changed the dynamic. He was so willing to speak on camera about it that at that point we believed it to be the best course to report the key aspects of what we knew along with his response.
On Friday morning, we asked Pastor Haggard to speak to us again, at which time he modified his story to include the claim that he bought methamphetamines from Mike Jones but didn't use them, and didn't have sex with him. One of our investigative producers, Amy Herdy, conducted this interview. This also is
streamed at 9News.com. It's fascinating to compare the two interviews. Meanwhile on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday there was news of some sort from the church, starting with the news that Haggard was temporarily stepping down from his roles, then that he was permanently removed from his leadership role, and finally his own words read by another pastor on Sunday.
VAP: During our initial interview on Wednesday night Pastor Haggard told us he had met with church leaders and that they had already started the overseer investigation into the allegations. That weighed heavily into our decision to go ahead with the story that night. At the time Pastor Haggard was eager to respond. On the radio show, they did not name him but they did narrow the field drastically—by saying it was a nationally known preacher from one of Colorado Springs largest churches (and even said it was not James Dobson).
We went with Mr. Jones' name because he never -- not even in August -- asked us to conceal his identity.
STEELE: What were the most significant journalistic challenges you faced as you
conducted that reporting?
RYAN: Originally we did not feel comfortable sharing what we knew with Haggard under the assumption that he could simply deny it and it would go away, but it's not the kind of story that you can typically just report in the form of "here's an allegation, here's the response." The allegations are explosive, the political and religious implications are enormous, and it's the type of story that can threaten our news organization and our careers, so we were very deliberate about how we went about this, yet the atmosphere in our newsroom Wednesday and Thursday, during the story's initial stages, was tense and difficult as we tried to decide how best to proceed. In addition to the effort to find and tell the truth, we also had some taste questions to consider. We never used any graphic descriptions of the claims of what went on between Jones and Haggard. To the best of my knowledge, Jones never really offered any to us.
VAP: Jones did offer many graphic details during his lengthy, live radio interviews. We had heard some of the details before but decided by saying "homosexual sex acts" and "drug use" we had covered the topic as tastefully as possible and with as much details as needed.
STEELE: What were the most challenging ethical issues you faced in reporting the
story?
RYAN: The journalism and the ethics are intertwined, but another ethical challenge was our treatment of the source. He admitted to us illegal behavior, involving both prostitution and drugs. Should our reporting take into account any of his potential legal liability? We thought our best way to go was to advise him to get a lawyer and let him decide what to tell us on the record. It still isn't clear what direction that aspect of the story will take.
STEELE: At what point did you believe you had a story that was ready for air?
RYAN: Very shortly before the newscast on Wednesday night. Our story at 10pm on Nov. 1 was not long or in-depth. It essentially amounted to a clip from Jones and a clip from Haggard. In retrospect, this was the most agonizing period of the process. In essence, it's the time where you ask yourself, "What is it about this story I DON'T know that I wish I did?" As it turns out, the original story Jones told us in August appears to be essentially true. But being in front of a story like that before you know where it's going is a very scary place to be. I wish I could say we made all our decisions with complete confidence, but the stakes in a story like this are such that you can't help but be a little nervous.
VAP: Agonizing is a good word for it. I've had about 100 viewers ask me the same questions you are asking us now. Many question the timing of the story—wondering if we waited to affect the election. Mr. Jones has been upfront about his motivations for the timing of his revelations. We wanted to wait until there was more documentation. He wanted it out because of the pro-marriage amendment and referendum I which gives same-sex couples some legal rights.
The choice for the timing belonged to Mr. Jones, not 9News. And, in the end, I am not sure if it ultimately helps or hurts either measure before our voters on Nov. 7.
I just posted an article about clergy abuse in 2006......
