Our little anonymity-gate

TONY DODERO

It wasn’t at the level of “Deep Throat” or anything like that. But

last week, we had a debate in the newsroom on the subject of

anonymous sources.

The source in question was an anonymous letter circulated to some

parents in the Newport-Mesa school district regarding an alleged

out-of-control party in Newport Coast.

The debate was whether or not we could use the letter or even

quotes from parents, who didn’t want to be named, in the published

story.

I agreed to allow the former but not the latter. And for

reference, I cited our in-house policy on anonymous sources:

“Anonymous sources should not be quoted in our stories unless

there is an extraordinarily compelling reason to believe that this

person would be in danger if they were named. In such rare cases, the

information must be of such a vital nature and of such great public

interest that we agree the source’s name must be protected. All

stories or columns that use anonymous sources should get final

approval from the editor or a senior editor.”

My belief is that anonymous sources should not be used, except for

rare circumstances. As a reporter, I can only think of one time that

I sought permission to use one.

But many believe that anonymous sources are vital to American

journalism.

Let’s take the case of the aforementioned Deep Throat, who

recently revealed himself as former FBI honcho W. Mark Felt and had

remained silent for decades.

Many believe that the crimes of President Nixon and the Watergate

scandal itself would never have surfaced if it were not for the use

of the anonymous information Felt fed Washington Post reporters Bob

Woodward and Carl Bernstein.

So, I thought I’d pose the question to the Daily Pilot newsroom,

which is full of young journalists, many of whom were not even born

when Nixon resigned.

Here’s what they had to say:

“Anonymous sources are a viable and necessary part of some news

stories, though it’s very rare,” said copy editor Matt Ballinger. “I

like (former Washington Post editor) Ben Bradlee’s approach: He

wanted to know who Deep Throat was. After The Times broke the

Schwarzenegger-groped-women story before the recall election, I

attended a talk with (Times editor) John Carroll ... about the whole

process. Carroll said anonymous sources must always be verifiable. I

think that’s the key. Trust but verify: It’s a motto we live by on

the copy desk as far as fact checking, and with anonymous sources

it’s a necessity to verify the accuracy and credibility of a source.

Those are my two cents.”

From our website editor Paul Anderson:

“I’ve almost never used anonymous sources throughout my career,

and I’ve gotten plenty of scoops,” he said. “You just have to

convince the source that it’s in their best interest to go on the

record. I’ve had a lot of success with that. But, when dealing with

state department types in Washington, it’s impossible to get most

stories without quoting people anonymously. That’s the actual policy

there. I recall once when I was a rookie reporter a state department

guy telling me -- after I asked for his name -- that he would give me

all the information I want, but I can only use this attribution: ‘a

state department official said.’ I suppose if you have a source you

can trust -- and you understand their motivation -- then it’s OK if

the story’s worth telling and you can’t get it out any other way.”

From our news assistant Linday Sandham:

“The more a paper uses anonymous sources, the less credible they

become to the readers. The safest rule would be to never use them,

ever. There are certainly extreme cases, such as Watergate, where if

an anonymous source is the only option then it needs to be

considered. Where would we be today if it weren’t for Deep Throat?

And had Deep Throat been revealed all those years ago, who knows what

could have happened to him?”

From our education reporter Michael Miller:

“I can’t disagree with the policy, although on a number of

occasions I’ve been frustrated by sources who gave valuable

information for several minutes on end, then quickly added that they

wanted all their comments ‘off the record.’ I can’t blame people for

wanting this, though. In the newspaper business, we’re always looking

to grab a story and make it attractive to readers, but at the same

time, our sources have private lives and jobs of their own, and often

would rather not wake up tomorrow morning with some personal bit of

information lying on the driveway.”

And from our enterprise and general assignment reporter Elia

Powers:

“I agree with [the] policy that these sources should be used ‘only

if the story can’t be told in any other way.’ As long as the

journalist can verify the identity and prove to editors his/her

credibility, it should be allowed in the most serious of instances.”

So there you have it. A fairly mature bit of answers from a crowd

of largely cub reporters and editors.

The media, including newspaper staffers, continue to post

horrendously low numbers when it comes to the public’s perception of

us.

While the high-profile cases of anonymous sources and bad

reporting get most of the publicity, I fear readers don’t know the

real story, and we do a bad job of telling it about ourselves -- that

story being that we take issues like this seriously and that the best

newsrooms are alive with debate over ethical quandaries like these.

I’d hope that Daily Pilot readers know we are always willing to

entertain these discussions.

Just not anonymously.

* TONY DODERO is the editor. He may be reached at (714) 966-4608

or by e-mail at tony.dodero @latimes.com.