Violence in Norwalk p.

By: Tony Case

Reporters and photographers covering the death of a local youth in this Connecticut town are attacked and beaten
MOGADISHU. BEIRUT. MEDELLIN.
Norwalk?
This Connecticut town, population 78,000, does not seem like a dangerous place for a journalist. But local reporters and photographers discovered recently that their suburban enclave and Somalia have more in common than they might have previously thought.
Their job July 6 was to cover a community meeting to address unanswered questions about the death of Keith Sumpter, an African-American youth who the previous week had exchanged gunfire with police before, according to officers on the scene, turning a gun on himself. Following the meeting, there would be a two-block procession to a memorial service for Sumpter.
It was during that short walk that the journalists ran into trouble.
Instead of taking notes and snapping pictures, they ended up defending themselves from angry black youths who threatened, chased and physically accosted them and destroyed their equipment.
Brian Pounds, a photographer for the Connecticut Post in Bridgeport, reported that he was "thrown to the ground and kicked and stomped on about half a dozen times." He suffered cuts and bruises and his $2,500 Nikon camera was ruined.
Pounds says the unrest was unlike anything he had witnessed in four years on the job.
"I've been threatened by people before. I've been in hairy positions. I've had people grab my camera, but I've never been physically attacked," he related.
Members of Norwalk's African-American community have said they do not believe the police department's version of the Sumpter shooting. The incident has caused tension between black leaders and police officials, so Pounds says he realized "the gravity of
the situation" and the potential for such a confrontation.
Michael Bisceglie, a free-lance photographer for the Norwalk Hour who
managed to avoid the row by ducking into a doorway, says he, too, had expected the march might turn ugly.
"They made threats from the start," he said of the attackers.
Bisceglie believes some of the black civic leaders who were present could have done more to prevent the run-in.
"I felt they did little to get some of their residents under control," he said. "In a way, I almost felt that they allowed it to happen, just to let them vent the anger. I think that they have relationships with the youth, and they
allowed the youth to go too far."
He pointed out that once the violence had started, the elders made an
effort to get it under control, "but they really didn't seem to get involved beforehand."
Hour reporter Aimee Hartnett related that several youths demanded that reporters and photographers leave the forum ? even though it was held in a public space and, furthermore, organizers had invited the media.
After she and her colleagues raised a
ruckus, a local NAACP representative told the youths that the journalists should be allowed to do their jobs, Hartnett said.
Practically all of the 300 people who attended the meeting were African-American, she reported, and all but one of the press contingent was white, "so it was intimidating, to say the least."
After the march to the memorial service began, the youths started getting rowdy again.
"They said they didn't want the media there," Hartnett related. "A couple said, 'We hate white people,' but we said, 'We're outside now. This is a news event, and we're going to take pictures.' "
Hartnett said she did not necessarily agree with Bisceglie's assertion that some community leaders actually encouraged the violence, but she certainly believes there was complicity.
"Nobody was really stepping in to stop it," she recalled.
Like Bisceglie, Hartnett managed to get away from the mob. She ran into the church where the memorial service was being held "because I really didn't want to get involved" in the scuffle, she said.
After the incident, Hour managing editor Jackson Ferry advised his staff about what to do if they found themselves in threatening situations.
"I don't know what newspapers do elsewhere . . . but we're a traditionally conservative, low-key local paper, and the general rule here has been to use your own common sense," he said. "If you feel threatened, then get out of the situation. Don't walk into it."
Ferry said if one of his reporters or photographers objects to covering a story because he or she does not feel safe, "we're perfectly willing to listen and to assign somebody else to the story."
Hour news staffers also discussed whether the paper should file a complaint with the police department.
Ferry determined, however, that the paper "doesn't want to become a party to events any more than necessary . . . because when we are, we sacrifice our ability to report on events that affect the public. It hurts our objectivity as an effective news conveyor."
WTIC-TV, the Fox affiliate in Hartford, Conn., which had a $40,000 camera damaged during the unrest, not only filed a complaint ? it has provided the police department with videotape of the incident.
Coleen Marren, the station's news director, said that as a "torch-carrying member of the Constitution," she was "shocked, dismayed and disturbed" to see her colleagues under siege. "We were simply doing our job," she maintained.
Marren, who serves as Project Sunshine chairwoman for the Society of Professional Journalists, thinks there is "no question there is somewhat of an anti-media sentiment out there . . . and we really have a problem with fundamental news gathering and dealing with people who are attracted to the camera lens. It's a grave concern when you're dealing with people's safety."
Ferry agrees that the media have an image problem.
"People perceive correctly that the press is capable of doing a great deal of damage as well as good," he said.
Many perceive journalists as conspiratorial, but "when you're working on deadline, there's no time to be conspiratorial," Ferry observed. "You're just trying to be as accurate as you can with the information that's available at the time."
In an editorial, the Hour called the assault "unfortunate" and went on to ask, "What is the role of the media here? It is to present as accurately as possible in a straightforward manner the events that transpire. Only by placing that information before the community can the community as a whole understand what's taking place and work toward a solution. There is nothing to be gained ? in fact, there is much to be lost ? by attacking the messenger because you don't like the news."
The Hour newsroom has received a number of threatening phone calls because of its coverage of the Sumpter shooting and the subsequent meeting and march, and Ferry is a little concerned.
The news department prides itself on its openness, he said; there is no security guard, no fancy alarm system.
"A person can walk in at any time ? and usually does ? to discuss things. I think the community appreciates that. But people who choose to threaten me personally because of our coverage . . . there's some intimidation there. It's also difficult to take it seriously."
Hartnett said while she has had a good relationship with black community leaders, "now everything's sort of changed. They're not as open with the press. I don't want to say they've shut us out, but they're not working with us as they had done before."
She lamented, "We've been put on notice pretty much that the minority community's got the impression that the press is behind the police department."
Pounds said, "The press is becoming more of a target all the time for people who have a problem with a situation and consider us responsible. It seems it's becoming OK these days to attack members of the media."
Bisceglie, who has been in the business for 16 years, said the down-with-journalists fervor is getting worse.
"This is Middle America, not the Middle East or Africa. It's very dangerous, right in everybody's hometown."
Bisceglie has wrangled with Hell's Angels and the KKK, "but those incidents looked like a Girl Scout jamboree compared to this latest attack."
Confrontations that a reporter or photographer faced a dozen years ago "didn't have the violence or uncertainty as run-ins today," he related. "It's so unpredictable, so random, there's no reasoning. It's like life has no importance on the streets these days."