Baldacci bars investigators from national TV interviews

PORTLAND – When you’re a police detective working on an extraordinary murder case in rural Maine, how do you say no to Katie Couric? Or Charlie Gibson? Or Stone Phillips?

For the Maine State Police, the question was moot when NBC, ABC and other networks came asking for live and one-on-one interviews for shows such as “Today,” “Good Morning America” and “Dateline.”

Early in the investigation of the arsenic poisonings in New Sweden, Gov. John Baldacci barred state employees from granting interviews to national TV networks. Officials reasoned that would lessen media “hyping” and let investigators spend more time working the case and less time preparing for a national TV audience.

Lee Umphrey, spokesman for Gov. Baldacci, said the decision was made by Baldacci’s communications staff and members of the Department of Public Safety and Bureau of Public Health. Umphrey said the policy was “best for the people of Maine and the community of New Sweden.”

“The collective thought was it was better to be understated, efficient and sensitive in getting through this without helping the national media make it look like a ‘Murder, She Wrote’ episode,” Umphrey said.

From the beginning, the poisonings at the Gustaf Adolph Evangelical Lutheran Church in New Sweden had all the makings of a sensational story, with more twists than a pretzel.

On April 27, 16 parishioners fell ill after drinking arsenic-laced coffee at a reception after Sunday services. Walter Morrill, 78, who lived next door to the church, died.

The poisonings were no accident, though, and police asked parishioners for DNA samples and fingerprints. Church member Daniel Bondeson, 53, then fatally shot himself in the chest. Police say Bondeson was at least “partially responsible” for the poisonings, but have left open the possibility that others were involved.

Predictably, the case has drawn national media attention, quite possibly more than any crime in Maine history, said Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the Department of Public Safety. Besides Maine media outlets, reporters from The New York Times, Boston Globe, Philadelphia Inquirer, Los Angeles Times, People magazine and other print publications converged on New Sweden.

TV crews from all the networks showed up. McCausland said interview requests poured in from “Today,” “Good Morning America,” “The Early Show,” “Dateline,” “48 Hours,” “20/20,” news shows on CNN, “Inside Edition” and even a local TV talk show in, of all places, San Antonio.

McCausland said it was impractical to accommodate the requests because it can take hours to travel to a location, prepare and give even one interview. If police gave one, they’d have to give them all, he said.

“They don’t get ‘no’ very often,” McCausland said of the networks. “They’re all concerned their competitor will get a sit-down [interview] and they won’t. Several have called me as often as four times a day.”

Andrew Merton, who teaches journalism at the University of New Hampshire, said the decision not to accommodate national TV could be “counterproductive” because it could lead to misinformation and rumors being reported.

He added that not appearing in interviews gives TV more control over the story, and more potential to sensationalize it. “So the sensationalism part of it doesn’t go away, and it becomes a part of the story – nobody’s talking.”

If it’s Maine’s wholesome image that officials are concerned about, Merton said he doesn’t see how talking to national TV would tarnish the state.

“It’s such a horrible event I don’t get how anything but the most cynical coverage would hurt the state of Maine,” he said.

State officials say they haven’t withheld information; they still had daily press briefings and gave out statements as the case developed. Before the directive not to give interviews to national TV, Public Safety Commissioner Michael Cantara appeared on CBS’ morning news show, and McCausland was on CNN.

Still, denying interview requests goes against the prevailing wisdom of how to deal with the media in a crisis situation, said Eric Peterson, who teaches journalism and public relations at the University of Maine in Orono.

The policy could lead to suspicion that something’s being withheld at a time when the public wants as much information as it can get, he said.

It’s also questionable if it would tone down the coverage. After all, CNN and MSNBC still carried live coverage of some of the press briefings in Caribou, and the case at times was the lead story for the morning news shows.

Then again, Peterson said, the decision might be applauded by Mainers.

“It may not play nationally very well, but may be fine in the state of Maine,” he said. “Mainers may say, ‘We don’t want all that national attention, we don’t want to see our state and state officials on national news for something like this.”‘