In a March 5 editorial reacting to Report/Mooresville Weekly questions, R&L Publisher Tim Dearman acknowledged that Swicegood – whose “beat” for 25 years has included county emergencies – was “handed” the phone by a county official “several years ago” but she returned it “a few months ago” because having it “could have been perceived as a conflict of interest."
The phone was issued through the Iredell County Sheriff's Office (ICSO). But the sheriff's chief deputy, Rick Dowdle, did not respond to Report questions about who specifically provided the phone and how long the county paid for it.
Deputy County Manager Tracy Jackson said the county's finance office can't answer those questions because Swicegood's detailed phone records – which are public documents – are accessible only through the ICSO since “the Sheriff's Office maintains the call detail records for cellular phone use by their personnel.”
Iredell's finance department receives only a summary page of the sheriff's office monthly cell-phone bill, which does not include names or numbers associated with issued cell phones. “This protects the Sheriff's deputies and informants by restricting these records from public access,” Jackson said.
A police reporter carrying a cell phone issued by her beat – in this case, the sheriff's office – “represents a clear conflict of interest,” said Kevin Z. Smith, chairman of the Society of Professional Journalists' (SPJ) ethics committee. He said SPJ's code of ethics suggests that journalists should avoid conflicts “to maintain the credibility of the journalist's work and to assure that the public's interests are being met and not those of her sources and the people on her beat.”
Avoiding conflicts of interest, real or perceived, and serving as watchdogs of government are widely-shared values of journalists. Those values are also included in SPJ's code of ethics.
“If she will accept a phone, then what else has she accepted you don't know about and what ground rules have been put in place to accommodate her, or worse, the (sheriff's) department?” Smith asked. “Are they trading a cheap cell phone for coverage?”
Fred Brown, vice chairman for the the SPJ ethics committee, said he could understand a cell phone being issued to a reporter if the phone granted her “special access to sheriff's office communications” or “better inside information on stories.”
However, he said, “no matter what the circumstances, she or her employer should pay the bills for the phone. The free press shouldn't be accepting taxpayer subsidies in that way.”
Jackson said to his knowledge, neither the R&L nor its parent company, Media General, reimbursed the county for Swicegood's use of the phone.
In a Feb. 25 e-mail to the Report, Jackson – who said he had consulted with the ICSO's Dowdle and County Finance Director Susan Blumenstein – said Swicegood was issued a county cell phone because she “is the lead for Crimestoppers in our county and can get critical information to media outlets quickly when a major crime occurs.”
He said Swicegood also “serves as the County's Public Information Officer during disaster situations.”
Dearman, in his March 5 editorial, called that “a rumor” that is “absolutely false.”
He said, however, that Swicegood has served “for many years” on the Iredell-Statesville Crimestoppers board and is “a volunteer member of the Local Emergency Planning Committee as a media representative.”
“Most counties have these types of boards, and many include media representatives,” Dearman wrote. “The staff of this newspaper is very involved in this community because we live here, raise our families here, pay taxes here and vote here.”
But experts in journalism-ethics agree that a reporter representing the same entity she covers for a newspaper is risky business: “There is no parity or equality in the reporting of news to the press when one member of one media outlet is an active member (paid or not) of the police department and works in unison with the police to decide what gets reported, who gets it and when that happens,” said the SPJ's Smith.
Dr. Lois Boynton, associate professor of ethics and public relations at UNC-Chapel Hill's School of Journalism and Mass Communication, agrees: “The competing loyalties can create an ethical conflict - will (Swicegood) cover the sheriff's department objectively if she is considered part of that organization?”
“It's difficult to serve two entities (even when well intentioned) particularly when the news media are to serve as watchdog of government offices, including the sheriff's department,” she said.
Added Smith: “This isn't being a watchdog of government; it's being an obedient police dog. The fact that this doesn't resonate with the reporter or the newspaper is alarming.
“This is a case where, if the reporter can't see the problem and conflict, her editor or publisher needs to step up and say, this relationship with the police department is not in the best interest of our mission of being an independent voice for the public when the government is concerned.”
But neither Dearman nor R&L Editor Dave Ibach responded to two e-mailed questions on March 3 about Swicegood's use of the county-funded cell phone. Instead, two days later, Dearman – also past-president of the N.C. Press Association – defended Swicegood's actions in a R&L editorial titled “Our commitment to integrity” (click document to enlarge):
“Working with us is logical if you want to reach the most people,” he wrote. “The leadership of this newspaper is completely committed to journalistic integrity. We are also committed to Statesville and Iredell County and make no apology for calling Iredell our home.”
Dearman went on to chastise other newspapers, saying: “The easiest path to take is complete noninvolvement in the community – like members of some metro newspapers who sit behind desks a few years and move on to the next town.”
Even while accusing Iredell's deputy manager of perpetuating a rumor when he said Swicegood is the county's public-information officer during disasters, Dearman lauded county officials for believing “they should speak for themselves without the information being filtered through a professional public relations person.”
He went on to praise county commissioners, too: “Iredell Commissioners have never wasted your money to hire professional public relations officials. Instead, they talk directly to the press and save you that expense.”
Protecting sources at any cost is another cornerstone of journalism.
Dearman said the county cell phone was used by Swicegood “to quickly disseminate information from county and city officials – emergency personnel and law enforcement – to the R&L.”
While, according to five months of detailed call records, many of Swicegood's calls were made to or received from various law-enforcement agencies, the county's messaging system and court offices, many other cell numbers, not as easily identifiable, are also listed on the reporter's phone records.
Perhaps those calls were all emergency-related, as Dearman suggested. Or perhaps some of the reporter's sources are vulnerable because their phone numbers, and thus their identities, are displayed on county records open to inspection not only by the sheriff but the public.
Dearman, in his editorial, said despite Swicegood carrying a county-funded cell phone for several years, her “ethics have never been compromised on the job.” In fact, he said, “She has written numerous stories critical of law enforcement – including a few years ago when she exposed a botched drug sale between undercover members of the Iredell County Sheriff's Office and the Statesville Police Department.”
But perhaps just as important as what the R&L has covered is what it hasn't.
In April 2010, the sheriff's office destroyed personal property belonging to Statesville resident Robert Goforth, which the sheriff's office had recovered from several thefts from Goforth's property. The items were supposed to be returned to Goforth, but the sheriff's office instead destroyed the property without a court order (Evidence room error destroys property and raises questions).
Goforth said he approached Swicegood about the situation, but the R&L never published a story about the property being destroyed in violation of state law.
Goforth then approached the Report, where the incident was later documented. Less than 24 hours later, the ICSO hand-delivered Goforth a $3,715 reimbursement check from the county for the destroyed property (Victim receives check, tongue-lashing from sheriff's chief deputy).
But that isn't the only time issues with the sheriff's office evidence-room went largely unreported by the R&L.
In 2008, Swicegood reported on the “multiple layers of safeguards” in the evidence rooms of the sheriff’s office and the Statesville Police Department.
In the article, Sheriff Phil Redmond alluded to an incident involving a deputy who “didn't follow the right procedures in submitting … weapons to the evidence room,” but the article did not elaborate. It also did not report a date for the incident or the name of the deputy who, according to Redmond, had followed “improper procedures in (the) handling of surrendered weapons.”
Two years later – and almost five years after the original incident – the Report published details of what happened, including the deputy's name (If you enforce the law, are you above the law?). Two months after that, a grand jury indicted the deputy for obstructing justice (Iredell County sheriff's deputy indicted).
The deputy, Tommy Adams – who, according to county personnel records, has been suspended from the sheriff's office five times in less than four years – is still employed at the ICSO but has been on unpaid suspension since the December 2010 indictment. (Click on the document below to enlarge:)
A reporter other than Swicegood reported on the indictment for the Statesville Record & Landmark.
The county paid Swicegood's cell-phone bill – about $23 a month – through the Jan. 8, 2011 billing cycle. The last call made from the phone was on Jan. 3. The number has been disconnected.
“The sheriff's office indicated to me that it was Ms. Swicegood’s decision to obtain a new phone and to obtain expanded services such as email,” said Jackson, adding that he is not aware of the county paying for the new phone in part or in whole.
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