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'Washington Post' Reporter Discusses Media, Sniper Case

Aired October 15, 2002 - 13:44   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We want to bring in "The Washington Post"'s Howard Kurtz, who also works for us here, does a show for us here on CNN, and helps us examine how we're doing our job and how the media, in general, is doing its job.
Howard, hello.

HOWARD KURTZ, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Hi, Daryn.

KAGAN: I don't know if you were able to hear the very end of the news conference, but he was talking specifically about technology, and he came out and said our pleas for people to be sensitive about getting out information basically has fallen upon deaf ears. And he says people have technology. They're going to use it; the information's going to get out there. But, once again, you could hear this chief's frustration.

KURTZ: Obviously, he's in a frustrating situation. And I understand he would like to control all the information. You know, they've had a series of news conferences and interviews on Sunday morning where they basically have declined to answer almost every question about this investigation. I understand they have to play this balancing act between keeping information confidential when they talk to witnesses who don't want their names plastered on TV and also trying to get information out to the press. But I don't think the press has done quite as bad a job as the chief seems to believe, although there has been a lot of 24-hour, round- the-clock, relentless speculation, much of it uninformed, in my view, about who the sniper might be.

KAGAN: Did you say a lot of it uninformed?

KURTZ: A lot of it uninformed, because some of the people doing the speculating are not part of the investigation and simply have no clue. In the space of about two days, Daryn, I heard that the sniper in the opinion of people yakking on television was young, was short, was a loser, probably served in Vietnam, might have ties to al Qaeda, probably was into stupid video games. Now, some of those things may be true, but we have no way of telling with the limited information, at this point, whether any or all of them are true.

KAGAN: Really, which says nothing in trying to catch the person or make these shootings stop.

KURTZ: Another problem, Daryn, I think is that, you know, in this competitive 24-hour environment, things get thrown on the air that are not fully checked out, or it may just be somewhat exaggerated. Last night, for example, several networks went with a report about a possible suspect being questioned in Baltimore who did have a van, who did have a rifle, who had ironically been shot by his girlfriend. Turns out to have had nothing to do with the case. Montgomery County police have been trying to knock down that report. Some people qualified and some people didn't. But there was an erroneous report that this Baltimore possible suspect had a Tarot card in his van. That apparently now is not the case.

So I think given the intense pressure on all of us and the edginess that obviously surrounds this story, some things are getting on the air and in print that have not been fully checked out.

KAGAN: All right. Howard Kurtz at "The Washington Post." Thank you so much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired October 15, 2002 - 13:44   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We want to bring in "The Washington Post"'s Howard Kurtz, who also works for us here, does a show for us here on CNN, and helps us examine how we're doing our job and how the media, in general, is doing its job.
Howard, hello.

HOWARD KURTZ, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Hi, Daryn.

KAGAN: I don't know if you were able to hear the very end of the news conference, but he was talking specifically about technology, and he came out and said our pleas for people to be sensitive about getting out information basically has fallen upon deaf ears. And he says people have technology. They're going to use it; the information's going to get out there. But, once again, you could hear this chief's frustration.

KURTZ: Obviously, he's in a frustrating situation. And I understand he would like to control all the information. You know, they've had a series of news conferences and interviews on Sunday morning where they basically have declined to answer almost every question about this investigation. I understand they have to play this balancing act between keeping information confidential when they talk to witnesses who don't want their names plastered on TV and also trying to get information out to the press. But I don't think the press has done quite as bad a job as the chief seems to believe, although there has been a lot of 24-hour, round- the-clock, relentless speculation, much of it uninformed, in my view, about who the sniper might be.

KAGAN: Did you say a lot of it uninformed?

KURTZ: A lot of it uninformed, because some of the people doing the speculating are not part of the investigation and simply have no clue. In the space of about two days, Daryn, I heard that the sniper in the opinion of people yakking on television was young, was short, was a loser, probably served in Vietnam, might have ties to al Qaeda, probably was into stupid video games. Now, some of those things may be true, but we have no way of telling with the limited information, at this point, whether any or all of them are true.

KAGAN: Really, which says nothing in trying to catch the person or make these shootings stop.

KURTZ: Another problem, Daryn, I think is that, you know, in this competitive 24-hour environment, things get thrown on the air that are not fully checked out, or it may just be somewhat exaggerated. Last night, for example, several networks went with a report about a possible suspect being questioned in Baltimore who did have a van, who did have a rifle, who had ironically been shot by his girlfriend. Turns out to have had nothing to do with the case. Montgomery County police have been trying to knock down that report. Some people qualified and some people didn't. But there was an erroneous report that this Baltimore possible suspect had a Tarot card in his van. That apparently now is not the case.

So I think given the intense pressure on all of us and the edginess that obviously surrounds this story, some things are getting on the air and in print that have not been fully checked out.

KAGAN: All right. Howard Kurtz at "The Washington Post." Thank you so much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com