Just came across this...
For Thursday, April 2, 1998
For further information:
Jane Akre or Steve Wilson (813) 789-8768
John Chamblee, ReportersU Attorney (813) 251-4542
Mark Ferrulo, FL PIRG (850) 224-3321
M.J. Williamson, Florida Consumer Action Network (813) 286-1226
Full details of suit and BGH story available at
http://www.foxBGHsuit.com in Tallahassee and Tampa.
Reporters Blow Whistle On News Station
FLORIDA MILK SUPPLY RIDDLED WITH
ARTIFICIAL HORMONE LINKED TO
CANCER; REPORTERS SAY THEY WERE
ORDERED TO LIE ABOUT IT ON FOX-TV
TAMPA- Two award-winning investigative reporters at the Fox-owned
television station in Tampa are blowing the whistle on a
story they say WTVT (Ch 13) and its corporate bosses preferred to coverup
rather than broadcast honestly and accurately.
The story, documented in a lawsuit the reporters filed Thursday,
reveals the widespread use of a
controversial bovine growth hormone Florida dairymen have been
secretly injecting into their cows.
The suit and information about use of the hormone in dairy cattle are
presented in full detail at a special Internet web site.
The site can be viewed at
http://www.foxBGHsuit.com
Though legal since approved by the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration in 1993, the artificial hormone
commonly known as BGH has been linked to cancer and is banned
throughout Europe and unapproved in
several other countries because of human health concerns.
The never-broadcast report also reveals how Florida supermarkets quietly
reneged on promises not to
sell milk from treated cows until the hormone gained widespread
acceptance by consumers. All major
supermarkets now admit BGH has found its way into virtually all the
state's milk supply.
The husband-and-wife investigative team joined with Florida's top
consumer groups--the Florida Public
Interest Research Group and the Consumer Action Network--to reveal the
BGH story at news conferences
Thursday in Tallahassee and Tampa.
The reporters also provided details of their suit which charges Fox
television, strongly pressured
by BGH-maker Monsanto, with violating the stateUs whistleblower act by
firing the journalists for
refusing to broadcast false reports and threatening to report the
stationUs conduct to the FCC.
Their complaint also claims the station violated the reportersU
contracts in dismissing them for
those reasons and it seeks a ruling from the court to determine to
what extent the reporters'
contractual obligations limit their ability to speak freely about the
rBGH issue.
The journalists filed the suit after struggling with Fox executives
most of last year to get the
story on the air. According to court papers, they were ultimately
dismissed December 2, 1997.
"Every editor has the right to kill a story and any honest reporter
will tell you that happens from
time to time when a news organization's self interest wins out over
the public interest," said Steve
Wilson, the station's former senior investigative reporter who helped
Akre produce the story and is
now one of the plaintiffs.
"But when media managers who are not journalists have so little regard
for the public trust that
they actually order reporters to broadcast false information and slant the
truth to curry the favor or
avoid the wrath of special interests as happened here, that is the day any
responsible reporter has to
stand up and say, "No way!" That is what Jane and I are saying with this
lawsuit," Wilson said.
"We are parents ourselves," Akre said. "It is not right for the station to
withhold this important health
information and solely as a matter of conscience we will not aid and abet
their effort to cover this up
any longer," she said. "Every parent and every consumer have the right to
know what they're pouring on
their children's morning cereal."
"We set out to tell Florida consumers the truth a giant chemical company
and a powerful dairy lobby
clearly doesn't want them to know," Wilson said. "That used to be
something investigative reporters won
awards for. As we've learned the hard way, it's something you can be fired
for these days whenever a news
organization places more value on its bottom line than on delivering the
news to its viewers honestly.
"We filed this lawsuit because itUs wrong to lose your job as a journalist
for standing up for the truth,"
Akre added. "We have every confidence that a jury will agree. And when it
does, after we're reimbursed for
our lost salaries and legal fees and other costs, every nickel over and
above that will be donated to a
journalism organization that can support the next journalist who has to
choose between his job and telling
the truth."
According to the suit, WTVT originally reviewed the investigative reports
and scheduled them to air in
four parts beginning February 24, 1997 and had even launched an extensive
radio ad campaign to draw
attention to the series. But virtually on the eve of the broadcast, the
station pulled the reports after
Monsanto hired a renowned New York attorney to complain to a top official
of Channel 13's parent company,
Fox television. The attorneyUs letter was filed with the complaint which
is now posted at the web site.
Local station management again carefully reviewed the investigative
reports, found no errors in any of the
reporting, re-scheduled them to air a week later, and even offered
Monsanto the opportunity to be
interviewed a second time, the suit says. Instead, the chemical maker
responded with another threatening
letter to the President of Fox's network news division and the WTVT
reports were postponed again.
In supporting papers filed with the court, the journalists say WTVT
General Manager David Boylan refused
to kill the story for fear the viewing public would learn the station
yielded to pressure from special
interests. Instead, Wilson and Akre allege, Boylan ordered the reporters
to broadcast a version which
contained demonstrably false information and he threatened to fire them
both within 48 hours if they
refused.
Instead of being fired, the complaint continues, Boylan offered to release
both reporters from further
obligations and pay them full salary for the balance of their contracts if
they would only agree never to
discuss the BGH story or how it was handled by the station. The reporters
declined the offer.
What followed was nearly nine months of writing and re-writing the scripts
more than 70 times, none of
which suited Fox management according to the complaint which says Boylan
then suspended both reporters but
ordered them to write two final versions while suspended.
The journalists say despite being locked out of their offices and the
station computer system which held
some of their research material, they produced both versions. One is the
version written by the reporters,
the other a version they say station management demanded they produce.
Both scripts are attached to the
suit with the so-called "mandated version" highlighted to include the
reporters' detailed objections.
"Nowhere in any of the dozens and dozens of versions weUve written did any
Fox manager or lawyer ever
point to even one error of fact," says reporter Steve Wilson. "Also, there
was never any credible claim
that either of us or anyone else who worked on the story ever conducted
ourselves with anything but the
highest journalistic ethics in researching and reporting the story."
The original BGH investigation was sanctioned by WTVT shortly after it
hired the two reporters in December
1996. Akre says she visited seven Florida dairy farms at random early last
year where she confirmed use of
the hormone at each and every one. A photographer videotaped the mass
injections of hundreds of cows on
two of the farms. The hormone is injected every two weeks to stimulate
milk production and boost dairy
profits.
Many scientists have expressed strong concerns about a possible link
between cancer and the consumption of
milk from cows injected with the synthetic hormone. Those and other human
health concerns have blocked its
approval in many other countries including Canada, New Zealand and every
member nation of the Europe
Union.
Nonetheless, Monsanto which developed and sells the product has always
insisted use of the hormone poses
no human health risk of any kind. The FDA, whose veterinary medicine
branch approved the animal drug in
1993, agrees.
Scientists who oppose the use of BGH argue that while the drug is said to
shorten the life of the cow by
speeding up its metabolism and causing certain infections, it also leads
to changes in the cowsU milk. Dr.
Samuel Epstein at the University of Illinois says, "There are highly
suggestive if not persuasive lines of
evidence showing that human consumption of milk from treated cows poses
unnecessary risks of breast and
colon cancer."
Epstein, an acknowledged expert on the environmental causes of cancer, has
three medical degrees, is the
author of nine books, and is frequently called to testify as an expert
before Congress. Other respected
experts share his position. Some like Dr. William von Meyer have stated
further concerns about whether BGH
milk may cause other long-term health problems in humans. All the critics
and even some BGH supporters
agree the possibility has never been thoroughly investigated.
Consumers have also expressed concern about how use of the drug can lead
to high levels of antibiotic
drugs in milk. Many farmers are forced to inject their animals with
powerful drugs to fight infections and
other side effects experienced by cows injected with the BGH.
No labeling law in Florida requires milk producers to tell consumers when
their milk or other dairy
products come from cows treated with the controversial hormone. In fact,
Monsanto has fought efforts by
dairies that do not use the product from saying so on their labels. Ben
and JerryUs ice cream, which buys
only from farmers who do not inject
their cows with BGH, just won a legal victory in Illinois to allow them to
label their products
artificial-BGH-free.
In Wisconsin, Vermont, and elsewhere, consumers have demanded grocers stop
carrying BGH milk or at least
give shoppers a choice at the dairy case.
"This is precisely what this is all about," said reporter Akre. "Yes, IUm
an investigative reporter but
IUm also a mother. I and every other mother and consumer deserve to hear
all that is known about what I
pour on my daughterUs cereal every morning. Only then can any of us decide
for ourselves if there is any
risk and whether it rises to a level we are willing to take."
