Affidavit

Ex-journalist’s affidavit called ‘information brokerage’

W&L ethicist says information was used to ‘discredit’ source rather than share with public

By BILL ATKINSON
VPA Publications Editor
The information that Charles Jackson obtained through normal reporter conduct was eventually made public, though not in the normal reporter manner, according to a Virginia journalism ethicist.

“He accepted plainly newsworthy information that was offered on a confidential basis, didn't do what we'd normally think he was professionally obligated to do with the information (namely, make it public while shielding his source), and then, instead, used it — entirely voluntarily and in the context of a court proceeding, not a news report,” said Ed Wasserman, Knight professor of journalism ethics at Washington & Lee University in Lexington.

Jackson, a former reporter for Leesburg Today, claimed in an affidavit last month that Loudoun Commonwealth’s Attorney James Plowman leaked him information about Mark David Tate, a candidate for the GOP nomination in the 27th Senate District. Tate was under investigation for election fraud. In the statement, Jackson said Plowman gave him financial data about Tate’s campaign and encouraged him to write negative articles about the candidate.

Tate, who was indicted on several election-related charges just prior to the June primary, lost the nomination to Jill H. Vogel. Plowman, a Republican, had endorsed Vogel over Tate.

Plowman’s office initiated the investigation of Tate, but he later recused himself. A special prosecutor is now handling the case.

In an e-mail, Wasserman said he found the situation involving Jackson “a puzzling affair.”

“I'm disturbed both by [Jackson’s] initial failure to disclose news publicly and by his subsequent disclosure in the context of litigation,” Wasserman said. “My opinion is that as a reporter, Jackson is obligated to make publicly significant information public. There may indeed be good reasons why doing so is unwise, unfair or unethical in a particular case. But I don't see evidence of them here.”

Wasserman said that it was his fear that “news gathered in a reporting capacity was instead used to further personal goals or settle personal scores. That, in my view, is information brokerage, not journalism.”

Jackson’s affidavit was requested by Tate’s defense team. Tate’s trial is set for later in the fall.

Responding to the affidavit, Plowman issued a statement calling it “factually correct in part, factually incorrect in many ways and containing an array of other assertions that purposefully present incomplete information and portray an obvious bias or slant to the truth.”