The Lesson of Atlanta Inquisition

Someone from a TV network called last weekend about getting together a panel on “whether the media jumped the gun” in the Richard Jewell case.

Whether they jumped the gun? That’s like asking if the Japanese were hasty in bombing Pearl Harbor.

The smear attack on Jewell also should live in infamy.

Its history speaks for itself:

A massive strike force bore down on Jewell on July 30, with wave after wave of frenzied reporters and TV crews arriving at his Atlanta apartment complex three days after a bombing in the city’s Centennial Olympic Park that injured 111 and caused two deaths.

Jewell, at first basking in praise as the security guard who noticed the knapsack containing the pipe bomb, was an unaware, somewhat sleepy target initially, grossly underestimating the potential enemy that would turn his life to flames. Many in the media did just that.

Driven by an accusatory front-page story in the Atlanta Journal saying Jewell was the FBI’s primary suspect, much of the rest of the media swooped down on him with law enforcement authorities, then hounded him and speculated wildly about him being the bomber. In effect, they were bombing him, the worst offenders beyond the Atlanta Journal being CNN (which displayed the newspaper’s headline and read the story almost verbatim), NBC, its cable partner MSNBC and local stations that spread innuendo as fact and informed analysis.

Tora! Tora! Tora!

Yet Jewell was never charged.

And now the Justice Department three months later says the oft-maligned, oft-ridiculed Jewell is a nonsuspect. One of his lawyers received an unapologetic letter from the U.S. attorney’s office Saturday saying Jewell was off the hook “barring any newly discovered evidence.” Right, and Mother Teresa is not a suspect “barring any newly discovered evidence.”

Happily, some in the media gave Jewell’s official exoneration as much prominence as they did reports of him being in FBI cross hairs.

Many historians believe that by pulling the economic giant United States into the conflict, the Pearl Harbor attack of Dec. 7, 1941, marked a turning point in World War II. Rummaging through the Atlanta ashes, it would be nice to report as well of the bombing’s positive side: that forcing many in the media to at last confront their worst demons marks a defining moment in the battle against irresponsible reporting, preventing the destruction of lives and reputations. That they’ll stroke their chins and acknowledge their errancy. That they’ll cry out in unison: Never again!

Don’t bet on it, for we’re speaking about amnesiacs here.

Some of the worst perpetrators continue to be in a state of denial. NBC News reported Sunday, for example, that Jewell may sue the FBI and members of the media who “first identified him as a suspect in the bombing.” That’s hardly it at all.

When it comes to the media, Jewell’s lawyers have severely criticized only those who, beyond merely naming Jewell, speedily indicted him either by tone or implication, as did NBC’s Tom Brokaw, although the anchor disagrees.

The People’s Right to Know vs. Richard Jewell is the latest skirmish in the eternal conflict between the free information flow required by the public in a democracy and the privacy of the individual. Also ongoing is the debate about whether criminal suspects should be identified in any case, given the prospect that some will not be charged. After all, how does stigmatizing the innocent serve the public?

Yet the Atlanta bombing, happening so soon after TWA Flight 800 was mysteriously blown from the skies, came under an immediate spotlight that was intensified by the clumping of so many global media in Atlanta to cover the Summer Olympics. Thus, perhaps only news outfits with inhuman courage and restraint could have withheld reporting Jewell being labeled a top suspect by authorities, especially when the story began erupting out of control.

Yet naming Jewell and leaving it at that is one thing; symbolically lynching him is another.

Legal experts have noted how difficult it is in the United States to win suits against the FBI and the media. On the possible libel front, for example, one could argue that Jewell, by virtue of his initial celebrity as a hero, was a public figure when his media tormentors started on him. If so, under libel law, wouldn’t he have to prove they acted with malice--that is to say, reckless disregard for the truth?

The defendants undoubtedly would plead honest ignorance, that they couldn’t recklessly disregard truth they weren’t aware of. The dumb defense usually works.

As someone once noted, though, the 1st Amendment is a shield, not a sword. And just because the media can do something under the law doesn’t mean they necessarily should. A press that sometimes misbehaves is the price we gladly pay for a press that’s free. The price Jewell paid, however, was too steep.

“I will now move on with my life,” an emotional Jewell said at a televised press conference Tuesday. Perhaps there’s a book or a TV movie here, but Jewell is not the smooth, facile operator you would envision cashing in as easily as others who have been victimized by the government or the media. Here’s hoping he sues their tails off, and wins or receives a settlement spectacular enough for everyone on the planet to notice.

Halloween is coming: Time to send a message to the goblins.