Courtroom antics were a disgrace

By MARSHALLJONES Sep 17 2006 http://www.kelownacapnews.com/
There's an old maxim of journalism that says a reporter should not become part of the story. That could mean many things, and I suppose by some definitions I wouldn't even be writing this column. But a classic example of that was displayed recently courtesy of John Harding, the managing editor of the Kelowna Daily Courier, the 'newspaper of record,' as Harding likes to call it. He deserved some credit at first. When a lawyer applied to gag the press from reporting evidence in a local murder trial at the end of August, Harding rode to the rescue and read the finest legal argument he could buy against it and to defend a free press. One of the lawyers offered to give Harding his Supreme Court robes, he spoke so well. You may already know this because it was front page news in The Courier, filled with good quotes Harding allowed as his own. The advance story of his appearance a day earlier was played up, as was the defeat a day later. All the media were fired up about it. It was the fifth ban on publication in this trial and the application by the lawyer was introduced at the last minute. All media outlets had a day to respond, which they did. We lost. I shared Harding's frustration. But Supreme Court Justice Mary Humphries, in an incredible courtesy to the media rarely seen in B.C. courtrooms, invited a return to the subject after she heard the evidence banned from being published. That testimony evidence ended Sept. 6 and she set a date the following morning to review the ban. Harding showed up Thursday morning to read another carefully prepared script, this one he proudly declared as his own. He had it cocked and loaded and sprayed it like a shotgun in the courtroom. He unloaded on Humphries, Crown prosecutors, the whole "great club of lawyers" who, he seemed to imply, exist only to stick it to his newspaper. He was flippant, snide, accused the court of being unfair, mocked the court and demanded that the judge "scrub the ban" from the books. I was never more embarrassed as a journalist. Everyone else in the room had been observing a trial for first degree murder. Family of the deceased were in the courtroom. A woman was facing life imprisonment. But nope, it was all about Harding. This wasn't some great principled stand. And it wasn't a mistake; the mistakes were in the baseless foundation on which he built his anger and spite. None of it was as he assumed, which also makes it ignorant besides everything else. I'm still not sure why he did it. Maybe he thinks a contempt of court hearing includes a badge of honour. He even made sure he threw in a little self-promotion as he told the judge that the story deserves to be told in "the pages of the newspaper of record (dramatic pause) the Daily Courier." And just as I expected (and why I never wrote about it initially), all Harding's comments appeared in his newspaper the following day. I couldn't tell which was more important, standing up for a free press or hawking his product. He was there on principle but when Humphries read her decision and said she's considering holding him in contempt, he was nowhere to be found. The Courier had a reporter in court, taking notes, but strangely no story appeared in the 'newspaper of record' the next day. Front page news when Harding has his say. Not even worth a mention when the judge has hers. That story didn't appear until Wednesday. And that's only because I phoned Harding and asked if he killed his own story. He said no and seemed puzzled himself why the story didn't run, as if he didn't know about it. When it finally ran, he slapped a more timely element on top and ran the story under the headline: Crown wraps up case in Black trial. It should have read: Editor killed own story.You can accuse me of being unfair since Harding and I compete in the same market and Harding may still be hauled before the court for contempt. But Harding's shallow disgrace ultimately reflects on me and every other journalist. And I have something to say about that.
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Newspapers dodge court contempt
Web posted on Tuesday, 19 September 2006 CHBC News
Two Kelowna newspapers have escaped contempt citations in a murder trial after apologizing in BC Supreme Court. The managing editor of the Kelowna Daily Courier, John Harding, apologized for "intemperate" comments he made while applying to have a publication ban lifted on parts of the trial. Capital News reporter Marshall Jones also apologized for publishing a child's name that was under a ban. He called it a mistake. The trial involves Ronda Black, who is accused of killing her husband by stabbing him in his throat in 1998.