Channel 4, First On The Story, Abided US Request Not To Air It

by Mark Jurkowitz
The Boston Globe
December 7, 2002

The search of the Quincy-based Ptech software firm did not come as news to reporter Joe Bergantino and his WBZ-TV (Channel 4) I-Team. In a decision that highlights the tricky relationship between the media and law enforcement, the station - which had tracked the case for six months - had acceded to government requests, made as late as Thursday night, not to air the explosive story for national security reasons.

After federal agents moved in, WBZ finally ran its lengthy investigative report on Ptech at noon yesterday, when anchor Liz Walker announced that ''in a story we've been tracking for months, authorities raid a business with suspected ties to Osama bin Laden.'' Bergantino told viewers the government launched its probe of the company only after ''federal agents got wind of our investigation.''

WBZ news director Peter Brown said the decision to hold the story prior to the search, which was backed by the station's corporate parent, Viacom, was fairly ''cut and dried ... Frankly, there wasn't a great deal of internal debate. I'm very conservative. I believe we have a role to play as citizens.''

Spokesmen at ABC and NBC acknowledged yesterday that they had also gone along with government entreaties not to broadcast any reports that could interfere with the investigation. But unlike WBZ, which was first tipped to problems at the software firm in June, those networks had been working on the story for only about a month.

Bergantino said the I-Team worked on the Ptech investigation throughout the summer, and in August ''got the word that the authorities are very interested in what we have ... We had the goods on the story back in August.'' Starting at that point, Brown added, ''We had phone calls from federal law enforcement agencies, some at the highest levels, asking us not to air the story ... on grounds of national security.''

As late as Thursday night - shortly before authorities arrived at Ptech - federal authorities asked WBZ to continue holding off, according to Brown. In an ironic twist, ABC cameras, rather than those of WBZ, were on the scene to record the late-night search.

Officials at the Customs Service and the US attorney's office did not respond to calls seeking comment on the matter yesterday.

The question of how to handle law enforcement requests regarding sensitive information often raises difficult ethical issues for the media. There was a major controversy, for example, over whether The New York Times and Washington Post did the right thing by agreeing with law enforcement requests to publish the Unabomber's 35,000-word manifesto in 1995.

''Our job is not to be the antagonist of the government but ... we're not there to be an extension of law enforcement,'' said Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

Representatives of ABC and NBC said their news operations came to the same conclusion as WBZ.

''We were asked by government officials at the highest level to hold off. That was a reasonable and responsible request that we honored,'' said ABC spokesman Jeffrey Schneider.

''In this case, we agreed because we were reasonably certain that our reporting would interfere with this investigation,'' added NBC spokeswoman Allison Gollust.

Alex Jones, director of Harvard's Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, said the decison to hold the story ''sounds legitimate to me. You have to use your best judgment and realize that the stakes are high. I think it's easier if you believe there is going to be a time in the relative near-term when you can go with the story.''

Still, Bergantino acknowledged he had some qualms about sitting on a story that not only had national security implications, but raised doubts about the effectiveness of the administration's war against terror.

''My concern is the political ramifications of the story,'' he said. ''My concern all along was that agencies asked us to hold the story so they could come out and do their raid and look like they're ahead of the game. In fact, they were behind the eight ball.''

© Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company.

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