Determination 115: Patty & Randy Brandt v. WCCO-TV
Attending the hearing were the complainants, Patty and Randy Brandt, dairy farmers from Marshall, MN. WCCO-TV declined to attend.
Background: In February 1996, WCCO-TV aired a two-part I-Team investigation about the deaths of cattle herds in Minnesota from Bovine Viral Diarrhea (BVD), a disease that affects cows’ immune systems and can spread through a herd. The reports said that meat from some of these diseased cows had entered the human food chain and created a potential health risk to meat consumers.
Patty and Randy Brandt said WCCO had asked them in January to participate in a human-interest story about farmers who were recovering from the loss of their herds. They agreed and were interviewed at their farm. The evening prior to the series’ scheduled broadcast, the Brandts said they saw an announcement on the station that promoted the series as a report about BVD, and included a clip from the reporter’s interview with Mr. Brandt. He said he could not sleep that night, and called the station at 7 a.m. the next morning to ask it to stop airing the announcement. Mr. Brandt told the station that he and his wife should not have been included in a story about BVD because their cows did not have BVD; he said they died as a result of their veterinarian’s mixing of two incompatible vaccines. The Brandts feared if WCCO’s story portrayed their cows as having died from BVD, it might harm the malpractice lawsuit they had pending against their veterinarian. WCCO declined the request and continued to air the promotional announcement.
The Brandts sent WCCO a letter of complaint, to which they received a generic response from the then general manager, John Culliton. They then sent the station a second letter of complaint, to which they received no response.
The Brandts met with the news director, Ted Canova, and the new general manager, Jan McDaniel, on March 15, 1997, to try to resolve their complaint. The parties were unable to reach a resolution, and a hearing was scheduled for April 10, 1997. On April 1, 1997, WCCO offered to do a follow-up story about the Brandts and the loss of their cows to veterinary malpractice. The Brandts accepted WCCO’s offer and their hearing was canceled. However, after the Brandts further considered WCCO’s offer, they decided a second story might do more harm than good, and would not hold the station accountable for its mistakes in the original story. Thus, the hearing was rescheduled.
Complaint: The Brandts said they had looked forward to participating in WCCO’s story as a means to educate the public about what can happen to farm managers. During the interview, the Brandts said, they talked about how the loss of their cows affected their lives and how veterinary malpractice was responsible for their loss. Of the 27 cows that died, all had been vaccinated by the veterinarian and all had a lump where they had received the vaccination. None of their non-vaccinated cows died.
Therefore, the Brandts said, they were surprised when they saw a promotional spot for the series about BVD in which Mr. Brandt was shown saying, “You poor people in town are going to eat this meat and not even know it.” Mrs. Brandt said his quote was taken completely out of context; she said the station had used it to indicate that people were going to eat meat infected with the BVD virus, when in fact Mr. Brandt had made that statement while discussing how drugs can be involved in the deaths of animals, and how these animals can enter the food chain. The Brandts concluded that his comment caused the station to abandon the story about farmers who lost their herds, and to focus instead on a story about cows infected with the BVD virus.
They believed that WCCO kept them in the story even though the station knew their cows did not have BVD, to support the report’s assertion that BVD was a widespread problem. In fact, Mrs. Brandt said, two of the other farm families included in the series did not have cows that suffered from BVD. She said they were especially surprised to be kept in the story about BVD given that they never discussed cattle diseases or BVD during their interview. Mr. Brandt said the only mention of BVD occurred when the reporter asked if their cows had BVD, and they answered “no.” The Brandts said that had they known the story was going to be about BVD, they would not have agreed to be a part of it.
Mrs. Brandt said that following the report they received a call from Ron Eustice, executive director of the Minnesota Beef Council, who accused Mr. Brandt of setting back the Minnesota beef industry 20 years. Further, she said, they heard from neighbors and friends who were surprised to hear that their cows had died of BVD.
Response: WCCO declined to respond in writing to the complaint, and did not appear at the hearing, saying that to defend its story it would have to show outtakes from the Brandt interview, a violation of station policy.
Discussion: Council member Mollie Hoben asked the Brandts if their cows had immune-system problems, like cows afflicted with BVD. Mrs. Brandt responded that their cows appeared to have immune-system problems because they all suffered from different ailments. However, autopsies concluded that their cows had not suffered from any disease; rather, they had died from a mixture of two incompatible vaccines. She added that during their veterinary malpractice lawsuit, the veterinarian himself did not suggest that disease caused the deaths.
Council member Nancy Conner asked Mr. Brandt to elaborate on his opening remarks that he suspected something might go awry during the interview and that the reporter might misconstrue his comments. Mr. Brandt replied that he feared the reporter might use his comments about drug-tainted meat entering the food chain to turn the story into one about the meat-inspection process, using him as a professional source because he had once worked as a meat inspector for the Food and Drug Administration. He said he never thought the story would become one about BVD.
Because WCCO was not present, Council member John Kostouros asked the Brandts how they thought WCCO came to the conclusion that their cows had died from BVD. Mrs. Brandt said WCCO told them they understood Mr. Brandt to have said that BVD was like AIDS, and that their cows died as if they had AIDS. However, the Brandts disagreed with that explanation. Mrs. Brandt said that during the interview the reporter asked them if their cows had BVD. When they answered “no,” the reporter asked why their cows died. To that question Mr. Brandt answered, “It was like they had AIDS.”
Deliberation: Members agreed that after viewing the series they were left with the impression that the Brandts’ cattle had died of BVD, as had the cattle of all the farmers featured in the series. Council member Jim Wychor said, “Having been around agriculture all my life, I can see how this could devastate someone who has livestock. People won’t stop by to visit because they conclude you have something they don’t want to catch.”
Council member Terry Thompson suggested some of the burden for understanding the nature of the story fell on the Brandts. Hoben disagreed, pointing out that the reporter specifically asked if the cows had died of BVD and they said “no.” “This was very clearly an inaccurate portrayal,” she said.
Council member Jim Pumarlo said that while he agreed that news sources need to have some degree of media sophistication, in this case the burden was clearly on WCCO, given that the Brandts, unlike a government official, had never before been called upon to be a news source. Council member Nedra Wicks added, “I hope we don’t get to the point that no lay person will talk to the media out of fear. The media would be much less successful in helping us learn,” she said.
Council member John Kostouros said he was not bothered by the fact that WCCO seemed to end up with a different story from the one it set out to do. “Changing the direction of a story is not uncommon, in some cases it’s good journalism,” he said. However, Kostouros found that WCCO fell short on its research. “If you’re doing a story on contamination in food, it’s simply Journalism 101 to make sure they had it.”
Determination: The Council upheld the complaint that WCCO inaccurately portrayed the Brandts’ cows as having died of Bovine Viral Diarrhea.
Concurring: Amaris, Conner, Hoben, Kostouros, Peterson, Pumarlo, Sellers, Wicks, Wychor
Dissenting: Thompson
Abstaining: Anderson
Addendum: The Council was prepared to address a second part of the complaint that WCCO treated the Brandts unfairly by changing the focus of the story they had agreed to be a part of without telling them, and then by declining to drop a promo in which they felt they were being misrepresented. Prior to the start of the hearing, the Council decided not to address that part of the complaint because WCCO was not in attendance, making a determination on that topic impossible.
Tags: WCCO-TV