As I mentioned before, Freedom Magazine launched a massive attack, in cooperation with other Scientology entities, in response to the St. Petersburg Time investigative report. Yes, there were personal attacks. Yes, they dug up information on some of the accusers, including from information that they conceivably assumed would be private.
But that's not new information. That's not unusual. They're doing the same thing with Anderson Cooper.
But what was unique was Scientology hiring two Journalists (Russell Carollo and Christopher Szechenyi), who in turn hired an editor (Steve Weinberg), to "investigate" the St. Petersburg Times. According to the society of Professional Journalists, this is something that's both unusual and ill-advised.
According to the three paid investigators, they insisted upon complete editorial freedom when they signed contracts with the Church, but also accepted the Church's requirement that the Church would ultimately have the freedom to decide when, as well as whether or not, to publish the report. To date, the results have not been released.
Fred Brown, former president of the Society of Professional Journalists, and current vice chairman of the SPJ Ethics Committee says that such contractual stipulations should have been a "red flag" to such veteran journalists. "It goes against the basis of any piece of investigative journalism," Brown said. "Investigative journalism is supposed to be when an organization whose mission is to get information to the public has an idea that something bad is going on and then tries to prove it. But here you've got an organization that doesn't want to get this information to the public, but wants it for its own internal satisfaction. Ethically, that's not something a journalist should get involved in."
Even a member of the team, Steve Weinberg, the hired editor, spoke out against the nature and conduct of the investigation after reflection. "More than any other existing organization that comes to mind, the Scientologists have been so hostile to outside journalists that I cannot see crossing the line to accept employment there." Although cashing the Scientology check gave Weinberg pause, he accepted the offer because of the promise of editorial freedom and financial betterment. He concluded that "This is unusual. I would presume that not many organizations that get covered seek and find investigative journalists who would then study the coverage."
And he's not the only one with such concerns. Chris Rodell, adjunct professor of magazine journalism at Point Park University and contributor to Sports Illustrated, Men's Health, Playboy, and Esquire, among other national magazines, has said that he's sympathetic to Weinberg's position. "I think ethics become elastic when you're a freelancer," Rodell said. "Everybody strives to be ethical, and I don't want to do anything that's going to hurt anyone or damage my own credibility, but if you don't have a paycheck coming in in a long time, you do become more or less ethical depending on the organization offering the money." Rodell said that he would not have accepted the assignment, as the Church of Scientology is "too historically hostile" to journalists.
Dani Elliot, professor and Eleanor Poynter Jamison Chair in Media Ethics and Press Policy at the University of South Florida, echoes the same concern. "Journalism by definition serves the public interest and not the private interest," she said. "And if you have an organization that has the power to decide what part of an investigation or whether the piece of writing is used or not used – and furthermore if that organization is not part of a news organization – then you're not talking about journalism, you're talking about public relations."
Sister Mary Ann Walsh, director of media relations for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, as another organization that has faced numerous public and controversial struggles, as offered public advice to the CoS: ignoring trouble won't make it go away. "If you're standing around with a chicken on your head, someone will ask about it," she said. "So when things are so obvious, we can expect people to ask about it. That's how we handle things internally. Externally, we try to get out as much information as possible. Hiding things is only going to make the situation worse."
The St. Petersburg Times, while aware of the counter-investigation, declined to participate, with Neil Brown, executive editor of the St. Petersburg Times, saying, "We were surprised and a little disappointed that they felt it was a good idea to stop what we were doing and cooperate on an independent review of our work, particularly when I, only upon pressing them, found out they were being paid to do it by the Church of Scientology. So they wanted us to participate in a study of our work paid for by the subjects of our work. It seemed odd at best. They have, at various points, threatened litigation against us for performing this kind of journalism. When you've been threatened with lawsuits, it doesn't make sense to have a conversation with subjects who are threatening you about the work. So, we ultimately had to say, this isn't an independent, objective review, and we've got a lot of journalism left to do and we're going to go forward with it." Participating, it was feared, would "fuel the religion's ongoing campaign to discredit The Times."
CoS Spokesperson, Tommy Davis, has only referenced the report as being "highly critical" of the Times, to which the reporting team has stated, of Davis, that he "did not accurately portray the full scope of our work" and urged the Church to release the report.