Reuters editor in chief says story wasn't spiked due to pressure

TALKING BIZ NEWS EXCLUSIVE

Reuters editor in chief David Schlesinger sent out the following e-mail Wednesday afternoon to the news service’s editorialÂ managers after Talking Biz News reported Monday that Reuters spiked a story about a hedge fund manager after he pressured them.

Schlesinger’s e-mail stated, “There’s been blog chatter in the US this week that I spiked a story because Devin told me to after he got a call from the story’s putative subject. I know many of our journalists have been concerned by the reports and even wondered if they were true.

“Don’t believe them.

“We make decisions on stories for editorial and journalistic reasons only.

“Those decisions, by their nature, are judgement calls and you of course are always free to question the judgement or debate the issues. But never doubt the commitment of this company and of me to our Trust principles and journalistic ethics.

“In my three years as Editor-in-Chief (and in the three years before that when I was running editorial operations), neither Tom nor Devin has ever asked me to kill a story or to run a story. I would have objected loudly if they had.

“They do — and I expect them to — onpass comments and complaints about stories we’ve done or are contemplating. Those comments come from customers, from competitors, from government officials, from ordinary citizens — the very same people who contact me directly scores of times per year.

“Whether the complaints come to me directly or via Tom or Devin, the result is the same: I listen; I look into the matter; I make up my own mind.

“The company named me editor forÂ my judgement, my experience, my ethics — it wants me to be independent because good journalism is good business.Â

“That’s how it should work. That’s how it does work.”

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View Comments

Celia says:
December 23, 2009 at 10:05 pm
OK Dave, and I have a bridge that I can sell you too.
Lex says:
December 23, 2009 at 11:45 pm
Sorry, Dave, but absent additional information, I'm not buying. Sure, it COULD have happened that way, but in my 25 years of real-life experience, it never once did.
Cooper says:
December 24, 2009 at 11:15 am
There is a reason why you are editor in chief and thus you are delegated the abilities to make those decisions at Reuters and you do a darn good job and dont let anybody convince you otherwise.
wall street journalist says:
December 24, 2009 at 1:31 pm
I am not buying Dave's statement. Goldstein is too good of an investigative reporter, who has been ahead of the SAC story for a while, to not try and get the Mrs. SAC lawsuit out there first. It is clear to me he'd been working on this news a while becuase he advanced the story outside of what was in the lawsuit within hours of it being filed. Reuters is lucky to have Goldstein on their team and I hope they learn to take care of him.
David Cay Johnston says:
December 26, 2009 at 12:59 pm
Totally UNexlained by David Schlesinger are the reasons the story was spiked or any hint that he plans to get a revised story published. That is troubling.
Significantly, Schlesinger does not suggest that he sent the reporter a message to do more work to get the story up to Reuters standards. Indeed, Schlesinger's words can reasonably be interpreted to mean that the story was permanently spiked and no further reporting on the issues and people will be done by Reuters.
Hinted at, but not stated, is that there was in fact a complaint of some kind that came before a decision to spike the story.
Finessing facts like this is PR, not journalism. For that PR response David Schlesinger's judgment in how he reacted to this leak about a spiked story is rightly called into question.
No Reuters reporter would be allowed to play games with facts like that, tapdancing around the issues and basically writing "trust me, I'm honest."
Without a doubt the spiking decision was David Schlesinger's own call. It would be stupid of others to ask him to kill a story in the terms Schlesinger cited. So what Schlesinger has done is knock down a straw man argument while ignoring the real issue.
There is a line between crudely asking that a story be killed and subtly getting across a message on behalf of a powerful party making a complaint that succeeds in getting a story killed.
Schlesinger is opaque on this and on whether he directed the reporter to do more work, and fast, to get the story redone to his satisfaction so that it can be published. Unless he has done that Schlesinger has sent a message about future complaints, a message that should trouble everyone in the Reuters newsrooms.
THAT is the question -- whether to pursue the facts until the story is up to Reuters standards or to cave in.
The test of an editor-in-chief is not that he relied on his own judgment, which is assumed, but whether in the face of complaints he stood up for honest journalism. The way to stand up is to demand as much more reporting as it takes to get the story right and to publish it was quickly as possible.
Denis Healey Appreciation Society says:
December 28, 2009 at 2:38 pm
First Law of Holes: if you are in one, stop digging.
Marktz says:
December 31, 2009 at 4:29 pm
I don't believe him. Why can't some publication with a serious spine hire Matt Goldstein and let him just do his damn thing?!?!