ABC HIT WITH A SECOND 'SLANTING' COMPLAINT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000100360010-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 21, 2011
• Sequence Number: 10
• Publication Date: January 15, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2011/12/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000100360010-4 /
LOS ANGELES TINES
15 January 1985
ABC HIT WITH A SECOND
`SLANTING' COMPLAINT
By DAVID CROOK,
Times Staff Writer
.A BC News has been slapped
with another complaint
charging it with deliberate
"news suppression" and distortion
in reporting CIA involvement with
a Honolulu investment firm, in-
cluding the charge that the agency
plotted to kill an American citizen.
The new filing was made to the
FCC on the same day that the
commission dismissed a similar CIA
fairness-doctrine complaint
against the network.
The new 45-page complaint by
the Washington-based American
Legal Foundation, a conservative
public-interest law firm, charges
that the network violated FCC
rules by "deliberately distorting,
slanting and falsifying" news
broadcasts, deceived viewers about
the accuracy of in-
formation broadcast
and presented "only
a single viewpoint"
on the controversial
issues raised in the
disputed Sept. 19
and 20, 1984, "World
News Tonight" re-
ports.
ABC had no comment on the
foundation's complaint.
The new charges are similar to
ones raised by the Central Intelli-
gence Agency in a complaint de-
nied Thursday by the staff of the
Federal Communications Commis-
sion. The new filing will be consid-
ered separately from the CIA's, the
FCC said Monday.
"We're handling it as a routine
fairness complaint that will be
handled at staff level," said Bill
Russell, director of the FCC's office
of congressional and public affairs.
In the new complaint, the foun-
dation asked the commission to
conduct a full-scale investigation
of the ABC broadcasts and to
"revoke the licenses of all of ABC's
owned and operated television sta-
tions" if the FCC finds that ABC
violated the terms of its broadcast
licenses. Also named in the com-
plaint was WJLA-TV, ABC's affili-
ated station in Washington.
Most significantly, the founda-
tion's complaint raises the novel
legal argument that ABC violated
FCC regulations by engaging in
deliberate suppression of informa-
tion "in an attempt to concoct a
sensational 'investigative' news
story that would attract viewers
even as it misled them."
The foundation's filing cites 15
"flagrant instances of news distor-
tion and/or news suppression" in
the ABC broadcasts.
Mi Thael P. McDonald, general
counsel of the foundation, said
Monday that the news-suppression
argument was advanced because
ABC purposely did not report in-
formation that undercut charges of
illegal CIA activities through the
now-bankrupt Honolulu invest-
ment firm of Bishop, Baldwin,
Rewald, Dillingham & Wong.
In the news reports, ABC said
that the CIA used Bishop, Baldwin
as a cover for clandestine agency
activities throughout Asia and the
Pacific, including illegal arms ship-
ments to Taiwan and efforts to
destabilize the economies of a num-
ber of foreign countries. ABC also
charged that the CIA plotted to
murder investment counselor Ron-
ald R. Rewald.
Information contrary to ABC's
charges was reported widely by
Hawaiian newspapers and TV sta-
tions as well as national news
media prior to the disputed broad-
casts, McDonald noted in a tele-
phone interview.
The CIA has acknowledged a
limited involvement with Rewald
and his company, but denied that it
had anything to do with any illegal
activities. The agency has denied
ABC's murder charge, which was
the key issue in the CIA's unprece-
dented complaint filed with the
FCC in November.
The FCC staff concluded that the
CIA's complaint "fail(ed) to estab-
lish prima facie complaints suffi-
cient to initiate a commission inqui-
ry or sanctions."
McDonald said that the founda-
tion's filing has a "better legal
argument" than the CIA's and
more fully satisfies the FCC's pro-
cedural requirements for fairness-
doctrine complaints.
"ABC deliberately suppressed
public information in order to en-
hance charges of CIA wrongdoing,"
McDonald said. The network's ac-
tion, he said, violated ABC's "im
plied fiduciary obligation to its
viewers to present accurate infor-
mation."
McDonald said that the principal
example of ABC's news suppres-
sion was in its reporting of the
charge raised by former prison
guard Scott T. Barnes that he was
made privy to a CIA plot to kill
Rewald. ABC had a two-year his-
tory of dealings with Barnes,
McDonald noted, and Barnes' cred-
ibility was suspect both within and
without the network.
ABC first encountered Barnes in
1982, when he charged that the
CIA ordered the killings of two,
Caucasians in Laos, The Times i
reported last month. After investi.
gating that charge, ABC "Nigh-
tline" anchor Ted Koppel subjec-
tively concluded that Barnes' story
could not be believed.
ABC was obliged, McDonald said,
to tell its viewers that there were
serious doubts about Barnes' credi-
bility.
"It wasn't enough for ABC cor-
respondent Gary Shepard to put a
camera on Scott Barnes and roll the
film," McDonald said. "He (Shep-
ard) was under an obligation to add
other information. It's suppression
of the news in the sense that ABC
denuded Barnes' statements of
their proper context. They (ABC)
wittingly enhanced the credibility
of his charges."
According to the foundation's
filing: "Many of ABC's top news
officials . . . were aware of the lack
of credibility of Scott Barnes,
ABC's 'star witness' on the exist-
ence of a CIA murder conspiracy.
"However, despite the wide-
spread knowledge within the ABC
news department that such allega-
tions were unfounded, the (sic)
ABC 'World News Tonight' went
.VW
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 Declassified and Approved For Release 2011/12/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000100360010-4
ahead with the scheduled broad-
casts and, by suppressing all con-
trary evidence absolving the CIA
of wrongdoing, perpetuated a fraud
upon the millions of viewers who
watched these programs."
The foundation's complaint did
not note, however, that there was a
major disagreement about Barnes'
1982 story within ABC. William
Lord, then executive producer of
"Nightline" had a "strong differ-
ence of opinion" with Koppel over
Barnes. David Burke, ABC News
executive vice president, said in an
interview with The Times last
month.
Lord later was named executive
producer of "World News Tonight"
and was in charge of the nightly
news program at the time of the
disputed September, 1984, broad-
casts.
"That didn't strengthen our posi- j
tion," McDonald said about the
filing's omission of the Koppel-
Lord disagreement.
The American Legal Foundation
was established in 1980 and de-
scribes itself as a conservative
public-interest law firm dealing
with media-related issues. Last
year, it set up the Libel Prosecution
Resource Center in Washington to
aid persons in suits against the
news media. The foundation claims
40,000 individual supporters across
the country as well as corporate
and nonprofit financial backing.
The foundation has two other
complaints currently under consid-
eration at the FCC-a 1983 filing
against the CBS documentary,
"The Uncounted Enemy: A Viet-
nam Deception" (currently the
subject of a widely publicized
$120-million libel suit) and a 1984
complaint against a segment of
CBS' "Our Times With Bill Moy-
ers" entitled "Pentagon Under-
ground." In the past, the foundation
has also filed against NBC.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2011/12/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000100360010-4