[Update — 1314, 30 July 95 — From a letter to the editor by Mike Hudson, editor of the Niagara Falls Reporter in Editor & Publsher:

I’ve worked with and for any number of Doug Cliftons over the past 29 years. Finally I decided to launch my own newspaper.]

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[Update — 1403, 29 July 05 — From the Ohio Newspaper Association comes news that:

Attorney Jerome Emoff told U.S. District Judge James S. Gwin that he gave the reporter a memo describing an FBI interview with Ricardo Teamor, a confidant of the former mayor who pleaded guilty in April to bribery.

Emoff declined to comment after the hearing, which the judge chose to conduct in Akron, where he maintains his office.

Clifton said Emoff gave documents to the newspaper, believing they were not sealed, and didn’t ask for a promise of confidentiality. He said initially we weren’t to use his name, but that should identification of his name become an issue, we could, Clifton said.]

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[Update — 0344, 27 July 05 — Roldo Bartimole continues his coverage and asks the question: where were all the honest people in this story?]

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[Update — 0553, 23 July 05 — The Plain Dealer reports this morning that:

A federal judge on Friday ordered the U.S. attorney’s office to launch a criminal investigation into who leaked — to The Plain Dealer and Scene magazine — three documents alleging widespread corruption in Cleveland City Hall under former Mayor Michael R. White.

At the conclusion of Judge calls for probe into leaks to media, Plain Dealer edtior Doug Clifton is quoted as saying that the paper:

…will honor its promise and will not reveal who leaked documents to its reporter.

We’ll go to jail if we have to, Clifton said.]

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[Update — 1837, 22 July 05 — Editor & Publisher goes back to Plain Dealer editor Doug Clifton to ask: now what? Writer Joe Strupp describes Clifton as exasperated and quotes him as saying:

I thought that it would help to dramatize to people the consequences” of the Judith Miller/Matthew Cooper case. Instead, it became a simplistic discussion of a chickenshit editor and a source he was protecting.

Not until the penultimate paragraph does Strupp get a central issue: the supposed profoundness of the story.

When asked if the seriousness of the story — a federal probe into a former mayor’s possible involvement in a wide-ranging bribery scandal — might have made it more worthwhile to publish, even with the potential for a federal probe of the source, Clifton said no. It is a good story, an interesting story, he said. But they still don’t have any goods on him. He still has not been indicted.

Well, yeah.]

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[Update — 1734, 21 July 05 — The Columbia Journalism Review continues its coverage, and, ouch! gives the props to the Scene.]

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[Update — 0314, 22 July 05 — In U.S. attorney seeks Plain Dealer source, Plain Dealer reporter Kaye Spector writes:

The U.S. attorney’s office wants a court hearing to find out who leaked documents to The Plain Dealer that revealed former Cleveland Mayor Michael R. White was the target of a probe that led to the indictment of consultant Nate Gray, one of White’s best friends.

U.S. Attorney Gregory White said in the filing Thursday that it appeared from stories in Thursday’s Plain Dealer and this week’s Scene magazine that at least three documents a federal judge sealed were improperly disclosed.

Attorney White said Thursday night that the disclosure has the potential for compromising an ongoing investigation.

He added that he had no immediate plans to issue subpoenas to find out who leaked the documents.

In commenting on White’s statement, Plain Dealer editor Doug Clifton said:

Once another medium identified us as a holder of the documents in question, holding back the story became moot, And we think that it was a public service to be done in reporting the contents of the affidavit.

According to Spector:

Clifton said the paper would honor its promises of confidentiality.]

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[Update — 1007, 21 July 05 — The day after the Plain Dealer did it’s us too release of the Michael White/Nate Gray story, the paper reports that:

A federal prosecutor asked a judge Thursday to determine how three documents under seal were released to newspapers reporting on a public corruption investigation involving the city’s former mayor.

And so it begins. ]

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[Update — 0701, 20 July 05 — This morning’s Plain Dealer repeats the story from yesterday’s Scene with no mention of of whether or not the Mike White/Nate Gray revelation is one of Doug Clifton’s items of profound interest.

As reported by Mike Tobin under the banner headline: White Was Target Of Federal Investigation, the news certainly lacks profoundness.]

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[Update — 1447, 20 July 05 — The Cleveland Scene in City For Sale claims that it has one of the two stories that Plain Dealer editor Doug Clifton has been exercising editorial judgment on.

If this is the best the story can generate, there is going to be a profoundness gap.]

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[Update — 0518, 19 July 05 — The On The Media audio file is now available. Fast forward to 3:32 minutes into the broadcast to hear Clifton. His Dumbest thing outburst comes at 10:27. The transcipt is promised for this afternoon.]

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[Update — 1019, 17 July 05 — On The Media’s Bob Garfield interviewed Doug Clifton on the controversial pair of the stories the Plain Dealer has not yet published. The MP3 and transcript of the interview have not yet been uploaded, but will be linked to here as soon as they become available. In the mean time, here are my on-the-fly notes from the interview.

Clifton started out the interview speaking in a calm and editorial voice, but by the end of the nine minutes, Garfield had gotten Clifton’s hackles up and the final exchange, while far short of something Jerry Springer would create, had fire in it.

The first point where Clifton asserted himself came when Garfield used the word withholding in reference to the two stories.

The Plain Dealer is not withholding the stories, Clifton replied. It was the New York Times that used the term withholding, Clifton continued. The news division has excercised editorial judgment in not printing the stories, which is different from withholding, he said.

One of the surprises came in the middle of the interview when Garfield asked about the involvement of the Plain Dealer’s publisher Alex (The Snake) Macheskee and the owners of the paper, Advance Group/Newhouse in the decision. Despirte writing in the 30 June editorial that:

but the newspaper isn”t willing to go to jail. That”s what the lawyers have told us;

Clifton told Garfield that while the paper’s publsher had been appraised of the story, he was not involved in the decision. The decision whether the paper should or shouldn’t publish was made by Clifton and the managing editor of the paper, Tom O’Hara, he said. So, who was the newspaper and what lawyers were involved? Clifton didn’t say.

Then things started to heat up when Garfiled asked: Isn’t the Plain Dealer being too cautious?

You don’t have a clue as to what the facts are, Clifton told Garfield. The bunch of arm chair people criticizing this have pissed me off mightily, he added.

According to Clifton, he has received some 200 letters from around the country from lawyers, editors and others, some of who have called him a coward for his inaction.

Near the end of the interview, Clifton said with frustration in his voice:

The dumbest thing I”ve ever done was to put those two paragraphs at the end of that editorial.

Garfield was quick to contradict him, but I’m sure that Clifton’s sentiment is a true one.]

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[Update — 0404, 17 July 05 — In Advisory network weighs in on confidential sources The Plain Dealer buries the lede and makes the important question No. 4 out of five questions. The paper asked 509 self-selected readers (more than half of who responded to the survey):

Doug Clifton, editor of The Plain Dealer, wrote a column about reporters protecting their sources. In the column, Clifton mentions his decision not to publish stories based on documents leaked to us. Publishing the stories would almost certainly lead to a leak investigation and the ultimate choice: talk or go to jail. The question is: Should The Plain Dealer have published stories based on these leaked documents?

According to the paper, the consensus response was:

It is the paper”s duty to publish stories in the public interest so long as the information was reliable.

Well, duh!]

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[Update — 1647, 15 July 05 — While surfing Google to read what others are saying about le affair de Clifton (if I blew the French, sue me) I came across Chris Geider’s Law Dork which has an interesting discussion and some comments concerning a posting by Iocaste following the publication of Fearing Legal Battle, Ohio Newspaper Holds Stories by the Los Angeles Times. Iocaste wrote:

If the Plain Dealer possesses documents that it obtained from someone who leaked them illegally, it does not matter whether the Plain Dealer publishes an article about them or not; if a prosecutor wants to investigate the leak, he or she will have the power to subpoena the Plain Dealer.

Certainly, the Plain Dealer is not attempting to conceal the mere fact that it possesses the information in the first place, so it’s not like the prosecutor won’t know where to look.

If the Plain Dealer’s concern is that the act of publishing the information is itself illegal — because the information is confidential — that, too, is misplaced. First, that concern has nothing to do with anonymous sources or journalistic privilege. Second, there actually is First Amendment protection for publication of information; think “Pentagon Papers.”

Seriously, do they have lawyers in Cleveland?

Well, yeah, we do. Any care to comment?

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[Update — 0217, 14 July 05 — The wrong-wing has piled on Doug Clifton with some, ahem, interesting theories.]

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[Update — 1646, 13 July 05 — What do Steve Bhaerman of Santa Rosa, California; Verda Ingle of Boone, North Carolina; Christopher Landy of Ardmore, Pennsylvania; Susan Gross of Annapolis, Maryland; Charles Tighe of Fullerton, California; John P. Parker and Geoffery L. Brown, both of Cleveland all have in common. They wrote letters-to-the editor and had them printed in today’s Plain Dealer on the subject of the stories editor Doug Clifton is holding onto.

This story has gone international with newspapers around the world commenting on Clifton’s decision.

Try googling +clifton +”plain dealer” +profound to see what the world is talking about. I got 867 hits.]

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[Update — 1506, 13 July 05 — Democracy Guy Tim Russo gets a response, of sorts, from the Plain Dealer’s Reader Advisory Bureau which writes to him:

Doug Clifton, editor of The Plain Dealer wrote a column about reporters protecting their sources. In the column, Clifton mentions his decision not to publish stories based on documents leaked to us . . .

people who would face deep trouble for having leaked them. Publishing the stories would almost certainly lead to a leak investigation and the ultimate choice: talk or go to jail.

The question is: Should The Plain Dealer have published stories based on these leaked documents?

In posing the questions, the bureau asks:

Please share with us your response to the following five questions. We need your reply by noon on Friday, July 15. A story will appear in the Sunday, July 17 paper.

So, what is the Reader Advisory Bureau, who sits on it and how are members selected? What sorts of things has the bureau provided information on in the past?

I’ll be looking forward to the response this Sunday.]

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[Update — 0815, 13 July 05 — Quoting Ohio’s reporter shield law, Bill Callahan makes the very persuasive argument in Dispatches From The Swamp that whatever Clifton is sitting on, it must involve the Federal Government. Callahan also points the finger at the Nate Gray investigation.

Both the Plain Dealer and Cleveland Magazine are covering the Gray story. (Thanks to Bill for providing the links in his comments.)]

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[Update — 0759, 13 July 05 — Steve FitzGerald, rises to Plain Dealer editor Doug Clifton’s defense in Lakewood Life. FitzGerald cites a comment I’ve heard from other sources as well about Clifton’s promise:

that if a PD story is killed under his watch, he would leave the PD.

The story, of course, has not been killed. Clifton has said that reporters are still working on it, just not with the benefit of the golden documents (see below).]

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[Update — 1808, 12 July 05 — The New York Times continues its spearing of The Plain Dealer in Most Editors Say They’d Publish Articles Based on Leaks. (The paper issued a correction, saying the use of the word Most in the head line was not justified.)

The Times does provide an additional clue as to what’s going on. It quotes Clifton as saying the Plain Dealer:

… was continuing its investigations, but without citing these golden documents detailing government corruption. (Emphasis mine. JH)]

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[Update — 1740, 12 July 05 — Chas Rich jumps into the story with Unknown Illegal Links.]

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[Update — 0850, 11 July 05 — Geoff Beckman thinks the story that Clifton is sitting on involves outing two politicians not named in the Nate Gray Bribery case. It could be. I’m not sure it would qualify as of profound importance though. Unless, of course, it involved someone of stature like Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell.]

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[Update — 1838, 10 July — The Columbia Journalism Review has picked up the story and begun to report on it.]