Poynter.org - Death in the Line of Duty

Death in the line of duty

Randy Cox, Senior Editor for Visuals, The Oregonian

That was the lead headline on the first full day of our coverage of the death of a Portland police officer last July. It was a week of much debate in the newsroom, and outside as well. In those six days of coverage, we questioned, in many ways, our duty to the public, to our readers, to ourselves.

And since that debate was so much at the core of journalism, and had so many interesting discussions, I couldn't resist basing this critique on that coverage. Though I mostly want to discuss our visual coverage of this event, I'm going to wind through this chronologically, beginning with our Tuesday, July 22, paper, where we gave it the most space.

Thursday, July 24:

FOUR DAYS AFTERWARD...This was the day when the picture editing really got interesting and was argued at much greater length. Picture editor Ben Brink made a phone call to the funeral home early in the day to see if we might have a photographer present. The funeral home didn't seem to have objections and we dispatched Ross Hamilton to see what was possible. At the beginning of the time Ross was there, the widow was inside. Ross carefully watched from the back of the funeral home, then waited outside until she left. He then made a number of photos, all from the back of the funeral home, of various folks paying their last respects to Officer Jeffries. That included other officers stationed in a kind of honor guard, as well as an off-duty officer, Tracy Bertalot, who came with her son. The picture editors, Ben Brink and Patty Reksten, selected that situation as the most telling image to offer for A1.

Since it was an open casket, there was much debate about exactly which image to use. (Click here to see both photos considered.) The picture editors and I favored the tighter shot as the best image, the most honoring a tribute, and the most telling. Editor Sandy Rowe was most concerned about the reader reaction to this situation and asked to see the final print before publishing. When I took that color print to her, she was still concerned about being able to see the top of Officer Jeffries' head just to the left of the off-duty officer's shoulder purse. She asked us to consider a different frame, and after more discussion, we went with the slightly looser view instead.

The next day, the paper did receive a few negative phone calls from readers, including one from Mary Benson, the wife of another Portland police officer. She thought it in poor taste to have used the casket photo considering the grief the police department was going through. I called Mrs. Benson back to hear more of her concerns. Her real concern was how to explain this to her son who picked up the paper and wondered if this could happen to his daddy. She admitted the newspaper gave her an opportunity to discuss this with her son in more detail. She also admitted, after our conversation, that she now better understood our reason for publishing the photo. It seemed to ease her initial concern that we had spent so much time thinking about this before publishing it, and that we thought the photograph was also a kind of tribute to his death and not just a way to sell more copies of the paper. She promised to call from time to time with other concerns she might have about photos we publish.

Friday, July 25:

FIVE DAYS AFTERWARD...On the day of the massive public memorial service and funeral, we led A1 with the previously mentioned photo of the mother and brother and repeated, in color, the funeral procession map from the day before.

The night before, reporter Dave Austin informed us that the widow had requested, through her in-laws, that she not be shown in photographs during the Friday activities. We made that known to the staff and asked for extra sensitivity during their photo and graphic coverage on Friday. Shooters Mike Lloyd, Ross Hamilton, Rose Howerter, Marv Bondarowicz, and Bob Ellis were instructed to still shoot the widow, from appropriate and respectful distances, along with the rest of the day's activities. I believe in these kinds of instances that we MUST make the photographs first, then make the EDITING decision afterward. If we don't have the photos in hand, then we'd never know if we would have used them. The picture desk (Kraig Scattarella, Ben Brink and Patty Reksten, along with lab chief Mike Zacchino) carefully developed a coverage plan to insure we were stationed at all the appropriate places along the route.

Saturday, July 26:

SIX DAYS AFTERWARD...We had decided in advance that if we got photos of the widow that were worth publishing consideration, we would deal with that when those photos were printed and available for discussion. Not only were we to dominate A1 that day, but had also carefully planned for an inside color picture page. The consensus in previous days was that Friday's procession was "more a visual story" than otherwise.

By 5 p.m., the picture editors had edited the best of more than 30 rolls of film, and we gathered in the news conference room to discuss what and how to use the photography. Peter Bhatia (executive editor) and Sandy Rowe (editor) were both out of town and quite concerned about how we would proceed, but they kept in close touch with Therese and me.

We all agreed that we needed and wanted to publish a photo of the widow and that the best, most appropriate, and still sensitive image was her receiving the folded flag from the police chief. We chose not to put it on A1, instead using it as the lead on the picture page. Then, because of the widow's expressed concern, we asked reporter Dave Austin to get involved. Dave wrote, afterward:

"Our photographers got a bunch of great shots and a number of them had the widow pictured. After the photo department meeting, we decided to call the widow at her parents' house where she had been cloistered all week. We spoke to her father, William Cahill, and told him we were planning to run a number of the photos and that his daughter was in them. We did this not as a request for permission but to let him know what we were planning. Initially, he was hesitant. His daughter had spoken to several family members about not wanting to be pictured. The family had also watched a Channel 8 newscast that showed her clinging to her husband's casket and they were suspicious of us, at best. It seemed that the ban on broadcast pictures was only for live shots.

We explained to the widow's father that we wanted to be sensitive to the family's needs and thought it was appropriate to let them know of our plans. We described the pictures we had in mind, explaining that they were pictures of Vicki being handed the flag and Officer Dave Thoman escorting her down an aisle.

The father was moved by our efforts to reach the family and didn't seem to take it as an invasion on their grieving. 'I really appreciate you calling like this. We've been a little nervous about the press but we're glad you took the time to reach us,' Cahill said. 'This whole thing has been hard for us. We're glad you're being sensitive to our concerns'."

Thanks to Dave Austin and his sensitive and convincing ways with the family, or we most likely would not have run a photograph of the widow at all, trying to respect her wishes. Although at least one of the local TV stations said they also wouldn't air footage of the widow, in the end, all three local stations did.

We were pleased to be able to go this way, but most agreed that the best photo of the day was of the widow at the casket of her slain husband. Ross Hamilton had a version of that moment that really tugged at your heart and the wire moved another version. Were we correct not to publish that photo? At the time, we thought so, especially because of all the concern expressed from the widow and our desire to be sensitive. Was there another way we might have been able to publish it sensitively? Should we have listened less to those inner voices and put it on A1 as the lead anyway (as TV had, in essence, done)? In hindsight, I think we handled it correctly. Photography, especially in such dramatic, emotion-filled situations, is just so visceral in its power to inform and in its power to overwhelm. We played it safe in this instance. (See photo comparisions for more discussion of photos of Vicki Jeffries we did not use.)

Sunday, July 27:

SEVEN DAYS AFTERWARD... On Sunday's A1, we came back with a piece discussed much earlier in the week, a piece delving into the lives and aftermath of other law enforcement officers who had been wounded in the line of duty. It was an excellent Sunday A1 kind of story, written tightly and shot/picture-edited in a most interesting fashion by combining five photos of the chosen subjects showing them discussing their different wounds. Ross Hamilton and Patty Reksten edited the photos and Michelle Wise handled the A1 design in a way that actually allowed us to use three photos without them looking undersized or jammed onto the page.

Without a doubt, this was a very interesting and revealing week!

Tuesday, July 22

TWO DAYS AFTERWARD...Though we were playing catch-up to some degree now - working for the Tuesday paper on an event that took place on Sunday night - the entire staff geared up quite well to fill this paper (two-thirds of the front page and two entire open pages inside) with intricate detail and strong reporting.

Our visual report was more than adequate, though certainly not as emotional in the photography as we hoped for. Kraig Scattarella scattered photographers around the city (the murder site, east precinct, university hospital, and where young Ben was shot), but we never were able to get that decisive moment of grief over this policeman's death we really wanted to display on A1.

The graphics department (through Linda Shankweiler, Randy Rasmussen, and Molly Swisher) worked admirably all day pulling together the details of the Sunday night events to give our readers, on the front page, an intricately detailed graphic showing the finer points of the chase that resulted in Officer Jerffrie's shooting. Without a dramatic lead, we opted to display this graphic as the main visual element on the front page with a secondary photo of the Portland police officer at the scene of the shooting. Picture editors Ben Brink and Patty Reksten rounded out our coverage by gathering the mugshots of the three key players (Jeffries, Hernandez, and young Ben) for the cover. Then, on the inside - with color available on the left-hand page - Michelle Wise and Jim Hays from presentation crafted a dramatic display of additional photos and graphics interspersed with our compelling written reporting.

In hindsight, I think we erred in not playing Kathryn Scott's powerful photograph of young Ben's mother on A1. At the time, it seemed to make sense to give it this large inside display as not really being "on point" in terms of emotion connected with Officer Jeffries. But it was by far our best photo of the day and was related in more than an adequate manner. I also think we erred in how we shaped and displayed the A1 graphic. It wasn't nearly as clear or as easy to follow as it should have been.

Wednesday, July 23:

THREE DAYS AFTERWARD...Though we still dominated the front page (designed by Mark Friesen) with the aftermath of the shooting, we considerably pared down our inside space by Wednesday morning.

On A1, Mike Lloyd gave the readers a moody photo of Antonio Hernandez at his arraignment, where we had stationed two photographers to insure we would get this photo from a couple of angles. Bob Ellis backed up Lloyd on that shoot. On the inside jump page, Dana Olsen provided us with the second strong photo of the ever-growing memorial that sprang up in the yard of the house where Officer Jeffries had been shot.

This was the second day of our coverage in which we were unable to get photographs of something we'd have preferred. Reporter David Austin scored an interview with the officer's father and brother, but despite our efforts, they declined to be photographed. What more could we have done to get that photo?

We certainly didn't want to push our way in during the height of the family's grief, but did we do everything we could to encourage that possibility? We were able to shoot the officer's mother and brother on Thursday evening, which gave us a compelling lead photo for Friday.

Publishing Challenges Offer
Growth Opportunities

By Kenny Irby

Every day journalists make tough decisions. Too often there is very little or no discourse about how and why the stories and photographs being presented to the reader/viewer were selected. In fact, each difficult decision is a learning opportunity in the making.

Concerned journalists must learn to effectively deal with the challenge of maximizing truthtelling while minimizing harm.

The Oregonian (Portland) worked hard, often struggling with the tough decisions on which photographs to publish after the death of Portland police officer Thomas Jeffries, who died in the line of duty. Challenged with a request by the fallen officer's widow, Vicki, that she not be shown in photographs at the funeral, the Oregonian staff faced a tough call. What next?

The following case study is a model of excellent visual reporting and thoughtful, reflective ethical decision-making.

Saturday, July 26... The runover page, requested as a color position, had originally been scheduled to also handle about a column's worth of jump text, but when the facing page became available we chose to treat it as a picture page. From the dozens of images available, from the many vantage points we had stationed photographers during the day, we put the page together as above, attempting to show that variety in a dramatic way. Since we had not run the widow's image on A1, we made it the dramatic lead photo on this page and complemented that with images of policemen hugging, the multi-car procession at the cemetery, the honor guard carrying the casket out of the morning funeral ceremony, citizens watching as the procession passed under the fire department's ladder-and-flag archway. Photographs by Ross Hamilton, Rose Howerter, Michael Lloyd, and Marv Bondarowicz.

On the runover, we published the widow's letter to her husband that was read at the morning funeral service, a nice touch to give our readers, especially considering how private the widow had been.