She also assessed the city $5,000 in punitive damages. It’s already cost the hapless taxpayers big-time: Nearly a year ago, an outraged judge ruled against the city and awarded the T&G $101,000 to cover about half the cost of the newspaper’s legal fees. Photo (cc) 2015 by Destination Worcester.įor years, the city of Worcester withheld public records about police misconduct that had been sought by the local daily newspaper, the Telegram & Gazette. We work on opposite sides of the campus, literally and figuratively: he’s the executive editor of Northeastern Global News, part of the university’s communications operation, and I’m a faculty member at the School of Journalism. “I’m proud of reporter Brad Petrishen for pursuing these records and thankful to our lawyers for successfully defending the public’s right to know.”Īnd, finally, my disclosure: David Nordman, who was the T&G’s editor until this past summer, is now a colleague of mine at Northeastern. “The Telegram & Gazette spent more than three years fighting for the right to have access to documents of considerable public interest,” T&G executive editor Michael McDermott was quoted as saying in Quemere’s post. The state Appeals Court agreed, overturning Kenton-Walker. The T&G’s lawyer, Jeffrey Pyle, appealed Kenton-Walker’s ruling, arguing that the paper’s legal fees of $217,000 should have been covered in their entirety given the city’s misconduct. District Court Judge Janet Kenton-Walker awarded the T&G $101,000 in legal fees in addition to the punitive damages, ruling that such a harsh penalty was justified because the city had misrepresented aspects of the case in its dealings with the court. Last summer I gave former Worcester city manager Edward Augustus a New England Muzzle Award, published by GBH News, for leading the effort to keep residents of his city in the dark about what their police department was up to. Open government watchdog Andrew Quemere writes that the T&G and the city reached a settlement in February for $180,000 to cover most of the paper’s legal fees plus $5,000 in punitive damages. Separate from Gatehouse, Davis owns the Holden Landmark Corporation, a Millbury-based newspaper publisher whose publications include Worcester Magazine, a weekly newspaper and daily online news site at 72 Shrewsbury St.A final price tag has been set on the city of Worcester’s years-long campaign to withhold public records pertaining to police misconduct from the Telegram & Gazette, the city’s daily paper, and its reporter Brad Petrishen. With the move, Gatehouse CEO Kirk Davis will have a significant personal stake in the area. Henry turned around and sold the publication to Halifax Media. Henry acquired the paper last year as a throw-in with his purchase of The Boston Globe. Up until last year, the T&G had been owned for several years by the New York Times Co. When it does, Gatehouse Media will oversee more than 500 publications in 31 states. The $280-million deal is expected to close early next year. New Media is the parent company for which Gatehouse Media operates all of its newspapers. New Media Investment Group has acquired the daily newspaper as part of a deal that will see it take control of all of Halifax Media's 35 publications, which include 24 daily newspapers. Less than a year after being unceremoniously dumped by Boston Red Sox owner John Henry in a sale to the Halifax Media Group of Florida, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette is changing hands yet again.
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