The Rochester Police Department is confused.
Its spokesman sent out this morning a note chastising members of the local news media, reminding them that they may have no contact with police officers unless they, the reporters, have received permission from the chief’s office, on a case-by-case basis, to do so.
The spokesman said that reporters were not to call officers on those officer’s personal telephones and that reporters were not to speak to any officers under any circumstances while those officers were off duty.
“As we move forward,” the spokesman wrote, “please ensure that you’re doing your part to stay within our guidelines.”
That’s where the department is confused.
Because the only guideline reporters work by is the U.S. Constitution.
Because police department guidelines are nothing more than workplace rules for employees of the police department. The police department may try to tell police officers what to do, but it cannot tell reporters what to do.
There is no legal authority for it to do so, and there is a specific constitutional principle forbidding it to do so. The government cannot abridge the freedom of the press, and the police department is the government. Consequently, the police department may not abridge the freedom of the press beyond any laws or restrictions that would apply to all citizens.
If others are free to talk to police officers when they are off duty, then reporters must be free to as well. If police officers may receive calls on their private phones from other individuals, than they may also receive calls on their private phones from individuals who happen to be reporters.
It’s not that complex.
It works like this: If a reporter wants to ask a police officer a question, he or she may. If the police officer wants to answer the question, he or she may. The police department, through its role as the police officer’s employer, may sanction the officer for answering. But the police department is not the reporter’s employer, and so it has no authority or power to sanction.
Nor does it have power to threaten, coerce or intimidate, and it only does so in violation of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.
Reporters ask people questions. That’s the job, that’s the role in society. They ask crime victims questions, they ask the criminally accused questions, and sometimes they ask police officers questions. Each of those individuals is free to answer or not. The rules don’t change, from the reporter’s standpoint, because of what the other person’s job is. And that’s true of all organizations – whether you work at City Hall or the hospital or the factory or the university.
The Rochester police spokesman went on to write that, “I have gone out of my way to make myself and the Officers of our department more available to the media than we ever have been. I’ve strived to create a great working environment of transparency between the RPD and the media and believe we are at an unprecedented level of cooperation.”
Those assertions are not accurate.
I’ve covered the Rochester Police Department for 35 years. It’s never been more closed than it is now. Chiefs have come and gone, spokesmen have come and gone. Some have liked me, some have not liked me. Some chiefs and commanding officers have frozen me out – as they are doing now – and some have called me from crime scenes and at home at night. They get to pick the relationship.
But my relationship – the reporter’s relationship – is unchanged. The duty of reporters is to the people and to the principle of transparent government through media oversight. That is best done through independence. Official spokesmen are a suggestion, they are one means of obtaining information. If a reporter is foolish enough to allow a spokesman to become the only or even primary means of obtaining information, that reporter is compromised and failing to do the job. You’re supposed to report, not regurgitate. Press conferences are nice and all, but they’re not news, they’re spin. And spin isn’t journalism. Spin doesn’t serve the public good.
And the chief’s office doesn’t always tell the truth.
I go back to a day when a Rochester police chief – a man I personally like a lot – turned out to be a felon, and we reported on him by reporting around him. I was in the chief’s office on the Sixth Floor when FBI agents flooded in to take him down. That doesn’t happen by waiting for an official statement from the spokesman, and it reminds you that sometimes the people in charge aren’t to be trusted. That’s not to question anyone’s truthfulness or integrity, but it is a reminder that reliance on the official line can sometimes take you far from the truth.
I also remember – before my day – that a Rochester reporter once ignored a police spokesman’s claim that rioting Attica prisoners had killed one another. He instead nosed around outside official channels to find a mostly hidden coroner's report that showed they had mostly, in fact, been killed by troopers’ guns.
Finally, I would say to the bosses at the Rochester police department – or to any organization – that when members of your organization leak to the press, that’s not a problem with the press, it’s a problem with your organization. If I have an officer’s private cell number, it’s because he gave it to me, and he gave it to me for a reason. The brass needs to realize that it is the reason. When they lose confidence in you, they turn to me. When they think that you will stonewall or conceal, or if they think you are going in the wrong direction, they go to a reporter.
You may think that they are being disobedient, but they generally think that they are being disrespected – by you. Organizations where members feel respected and empowered, where they have professional respect for the abilities of their bosses, where espirit de corps and morale are high, are organizations that don’t leak. As those qualities decrease, leaks increase.
And sometimes, leaks come from bosses, and can be useful. Some police bosses will hold a press conference where they will make an official statement, and then step aside with a reporter to share the backstory in a confidential fashion. Anything can work.
Except what the Rochester spokesman is trying now.
He’s not the boss of the press, and he’s not the boss of what gets reported about the police department or how that information is gathered, and he shouldn’t act like it. He is a functionary whose job is to meet the needs of reporters and facilitate their duty to keep the public informed.
He needs to remember that, and so do the reporters.