a knife in the store where he worked a few weeks before the double murders. But the witness’s damning words turned into every prosecutor’s worst nightmare come true. Camacho had to confess that he accepted $12,500 from the Enquirer after Hard Copy had offered him “peanuts.” Prosecutors tried their best to salvage Camacho’s credibility by stressing that he sold his story only after his testimony at grand jury. Obviously, the strategy didn’t work.
Jill Shively, another star witness in the case, testified in front of the grand jury that she saw Simpson driving like a madman near the scene of the murders. Prosecutors had no alternative but to to scuttle her testimony after she sold her story to Hard Copy for a reported $5,000.
This blatant brokering for the “dirt” on a sensational case isn’t even done in secret. The Enquirer ’s editor appeared on Larry King Live to show off the $1 million check the tabloid had offered to Al Cowlings to tell what really happened in the white Bronco during the chase seen around the world. In one of the only displays of restraint shown by the major players in that case at the time, the Simpson insider opted not to jump on the trial’s gravy train. Cowlings did wind up cashing in, however, selling autographed photos of the infamous Bronco chase online.
This phenomenon of witnesses selling out to the media isn’t a by-product of our 24/7 media age—it only seems that way because the number of outlets vying for “exclusives” has grown exponentially in the last few years. Paying for stories is a dangerous and destructive tradition. And it’s not just scandal-mongering tabloids and TV shows that shell out big bucks for salacious stories to sell. A 1994 issue of that Columbia Journalism Review reported that the revered 60 Minutes paid Richard Nixon’s henchman H. R. Haldeman $25,000 for his story in 1975. G. Gordon Liddy went for the reduced rate of $15,000. Nixon himself brought in the biggest haul. Swifty Lazar, the late Hollywood über-agent, brokered a $600,000 deal for Nixon’s interview with David O B J E C T I O N !
7 1
Frost that aired in 1977. Frost defended himself on CNN in 2002, saying at least he got to quiz Nixon on television, as opposed to the watered-down version the disgraced ex-president offered in his book—for which he received $2.3 million.
Clearly, the shady practice is alive and well today. In January 2004, the New York Times reported that CBS news magazine 60 Minutes paid Michael Jackson $1 million for an exclusive interview after he’d been charged with child molestation. While the network called the allegations “categorically false,” a CBS spokeswoman acknowledged that there was another deal that had been struck with the King of Pop. Jackson had to deny the charges on air during the 60 Minutes interview in order for the network to consider broadcasting his musical special, pulled from CBS’s schedule after Jackson’s arrest in November 2003.
Another television icon bites the dust.
J U S T S H U T U P !
Legislation could easily be passed in each state to outlaw payment or anticipated payment of witnesses and other participants in criminal cases before trials. The First Amendment protects free speech—not storytelling for fame and profit. To witnesses who just can’t shut up, I say tell your story for free before trial if you absolutely must—if jeopardizing the case means nothing to you—but do not pass go, do not broker a deal, and do not collect any cash until after the trial. Judge Alfred DeLucchi implemented a great idea after the Scott Peterson guilty verdict. He disallowed any form of payment, not so much as a fruit basket, to Peterson jurors in exchange for talking until ninety days following Peterson’s sentencing.
This way everybody’s happy: loose-lipped witnesses, the prosecution, the victim, and the victim’s family. There’s one sad face in the crowd: the defense attorney who just got robbed of a potentially
Jill Shively, another star witness in the case, testified in front of the grand jury that she saw Simpson driving like a madman near the scene of the murders. Prosecutors had no alternative but to to scuttle her testimony after she sold her story to Hard Copy for a reported $5,000.
This blatant brokering for the “dirt” on a sensational case isn’t even done in secret. The Enquirer ’s editor appeared on Larry King Live to show off the $1 million check the tabloid had offered to Al Cowlings to tell what really happened in the white Bronco during the chase seen around the world. In one of the only displays of restraint shown by the major players in that case at the time, the Simpson insider opted not to jump on the trial’s gravy train. Cowlings did wind up cashing in, however, selling autographed photos of the infamous Bronco chase online.
This phenomenon of witnesses selling out to the media isn’t a by-product of our 24/7 media age—it only seems that way because the number of outlets vying for “exclusives” has grown exponentially in the last few years. Paying for stories is a dangerous and destructive tradition. And it’s not just scandal-mongering tabloids and TV shows that shell out big bucks for salacious stories to sell. A 1994 issue of that Columbia Journalism Review reported that the revered 60 Minutes paid Richard Nixon’s henchman H. R. Haldeman $25,000 for his story in 1975. G. Gordon Liddy went for the reduced rate of $15,000. Nixon himself brought in the biggest haul. Swifty Lazar, the late Hollywood über-agent, brokered a $600,000 deal for Nixon’s interview with David O B J E C T I O N !
7 1
Frost that aired in 1977. Frost defended himself on CNN in 2002, saying at least he got to quiz Nixon on television, as opposed to the watered-down version the disgraced ex-president offered in his book—for which he received $2.3 million.
Clearly, the shady practice is alive and well today. In January 2004, the New York Times reported that CBS news magazine 60 Minutes paid Michael Jackson $1 million for an exclusive interview after he’d been charged with child molestation. While the network called the allegations “categorically false,” a CBS spokeswoman acknowledged that there was another deal that had been struck with the King of Pop. Jackson had to deny the charges on air during the 60 Minutes interview in order for the network to consider broadcasting his musical special, pulled from CBS’s schedule after Jackson’s arrest in November 2003.
Another television icon bites the dust.
J U S T S H U T U P !
Legislation could easily be passed in each state to outlaw payment or anticipated payment of witnesses and other participants in criminal cases before trials. The First Amendment protects free speech—not storytelling for fame and profit. To witnesses who just can’t shut up, I say tell your story for free before trial if you absolutely must—if jeopardizing the case means nothing to you—but do not pass go, do not broker a deal, and do not collect any cash until after the trial. Judge Alfred DeLucchi implemented a great idea after the Scott Peterson guilty verdict. He disallowed any form of payment, not so much as a fruit basket, to Peterson jurors in exchange for talking until ninety days following Peterson’s sentencing.
This way everybody’s happy: loose-lipped witnesses, the prosecution, the victim, and the victim’s family. There’s one sad face in the crowd: the defense attorney who just got robbed of a potentially
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