More Memo Fallout: Tribune Co. Suspends Abrams Indefinitely Without Pay

Tribune Co. Chief Innovation Officer was suspended indefinitely without pay Wednesday because of a company-wide message he sent that included a link to a sex-themed video.

“He will remain on suspension indefinitely and without pay while we review the circumstances surrounding the email and video link he distributed on Monday,” Tribune CEO Randy Michaels wrote in a message to employees. “We're in the process of determining further disciplinary action.”

Michaels said Abrams had apologized both publicly and personally to Michaels and that the executive “recognizes that the video was in extremely bad taste” and offended employees.

“But, this is the kind of serious mistake that can't be tolerated; we intend to address it promptly and forcefully,” he added.

Earlier coverage:

Tribune Co. Chief Innovation Officer Lee Abrams followed up a company-wide memo that included links to sex-themed videos with an apology that promised “to make sure that my future emails contain nothing like this video ever again.”

On Monday, Abrams sent a “Think Piece” memo to employees across Tribune Co. that, among other things, included a link to videos from the satirical weekly The Onion, most notably a link labeled “Slut” that showed a woman pouring liquor over her bare breasts. The memo prompted complaints to the company’s human resources department by employees including the editor of the flagship Chicago Tribune, Gerould Kern.

“It was poor judgment on my part and I'm sorry,” Abrams wrote in the follow-up memo late Tuesday. “The video in bad taste was a parody of a cable-type reality show. It is not something that we would ever air on our TV stations - in fact quite the opposite - we show this as an example of what NOT to do.

“But still, I understand that it was very inappropriate to distribute a link to the video to a wider audience, and I have asked our technology department to delete the email from our servers. Again, I'm sorry for offending anyone, and I promise to make sure that my future emails contain nothing like this video ever again.”

Just a week after top executives stoutly denied incidents recounted in a front-page story that portrayed Tribune Co.’s top management as sexist frat boys, the Chicago media giant’s chief innovation officer sent a company-wide memo that included sexual content that moved employees including Chicago Tribune Editor Gerould Kern to complain to the human resources department. Chicago Tribune media columnist Phil Rosenthal

reports on the newspaper's Website here.

Rosenthal’s detailed story reports the memo from innovation chief Lee Abrams included links to video at the Website of the satirical weekly The Onion. Among them was a fictional report on a bus crash that killed reality show stars. Among the scenes, in Rosenthal’s words, is one “in which a gyrating woman appears to pour liquor on her bare breasts.”