Friday, March 25, 2011
Ethics
"Bus Driver in Bronx Crash Says He Was Sober and Awake" is an ongoing story about Ophadell Williams, who drove a bus that crashed and killed 15 passengers. This article was published Wednesday, March 23, 2011. I don't believe there was any libel in the story, but the New York Times had to consider libel when publishing it. There were statements made by other people that could be seen as defamatory, especially the statements about Williams' bad driving, which could cause injury to him in his career as a bus driver. The New York Times didn't publish any of those quotes though, and only paraphrased the statements about his bad driving, so that probably ensures protection from libel. Williams was easily identified, and the story even comes with a mug shot, even though it's not a good one. The New York Times published quotes mostly by his lawyers, who wouldn't try to defame their client anyway. The story was libel-free, but they could have handled it in an entirely different way that would have put them at risk for libeling Williams. It's the kind of story that could have easily become a libelous one.
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I like that you talked about what could have happened to make the story libel. I feel it is important to understand how journalist do a good job to make stories accurate with out libel.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Megan. Its also interesting to read the article and see the way that the New York Times wrote the whole story. It seems like there are less facts since most of the issues were just people's opinions so they focused on paraphrasing and quoting other people to about libel. I also thought it was interesting how they wrote at the bottom that one of his lawyers was complaining about other news organizations and how they were posing the story. I think it helps show more accuracy and accreditation to the NYT.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Megan too, this story could have easily turned ugly if the NYT had put a different spin on it. Even more quotes or info about the driver may have implicated him or at least seem to accuse him.
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