OLD Media Moves

The story that killed Kurt Eichenwald's career

October 29, 2007

Posted by Chris Roush

David France of New York magazine writes Monday about how former New York Times and Conde Nast Portfolio business reporter Kurt Eichenwald killed his career by getting involved in a story on child pornography.

Kurt EichenwaldFrance wrote, “Now Eichenwald has been ensnared by his own campaign. His reporting methods are under intense scrutiny, and he’s been pilloried by other journalists, by pro-sex activists, and by people whom his investigations helped to put in jail.

“As the controversy has grown, Eichenwald has bunkered himself in his Dallas home. He has family members answer his doorbell. As our talk began, he closed the doors of his home office, which is tightly shuttered against a beautiful morning, though there is no one in the house but the two of us and the family’s three-legged dog, Maggie.

“The fight he’s found himself in has wreaked havoc on his life. He’s teary, volatile, largely unable to work. He left the Times, then walked away from a large contract at Portfolio. His career is in tatters. For this, he blames a campaign by the convicts he’s exposed, other child molesters he doesn’t even know, random anonymous bloggers, and journalists, specifically the advocacy journalist Debbie Nathan, who has written several long pieces questioning his reporting methods and whom he calls ‘the high priestess of pedophilia.’ He believes they are acting in concert to destroy him, professionally and emotionally.”

Read more here.

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