From left: Evan Benn, Nicole Lapin, and Sam Weiner.
Yesterday, two Medill alums stood beside their former professor, David Protess, as he answered questions about new allegations that his students improperly pursued information in their efforts to exonerate a convicted killer. (Here’s a primer on the case.)
The photogenic alums—Nicole Lapin ’05, a CNN anchorwoman, and Evan Benn ’04, a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch—continued Protess’ damage-control efforts this morning, on a conference call with a Medill Media Law class. Both grads said they were surprised by the prosecutorial accusations of witness bribery, which according to Benn, “came out of left field.” “We paid for their hash browns or whatever,” said Lapin. “We didn’t pay them for information.”
According to Benn, one witness, Anthony Drake, knew the $60 students gave his cab driver was “for the fare from here to the bus station, no funny business.” They also stressed that they were led to interview Drake by six other witnesses who have said, in affidavits, that he told them the same story. Still, Lapin said that Drake’s revelation “may cancel out” the video interview as evidence.
Of the accusations of misconduct, Benn said, “I don’t think it’s going to smear the Medill Innocence Project’s work. That’s beyond reproach.”
Lapin and Benn have been the public face of the journalists involved, but weren’t the only journalists whose notes and grades were subpoenaed. So Buzzard editor Michael Kaplan sought out some others and got their opinions.
Sam Weiner
Weiner graduated from NU in 2006 and took Protess’ class in the fall of 2005 and the winter of 2006. He worked on the Anthony McKinney case and believes his grades were included in those subpoenaed by the state prosecutor. He is currently a 2nd-year law student at UC Berkeley.
Kelly Nolan Cortesi
Cortesi graduated from Northwestern in 2005. She worked on the case during the spring of 2005. She currently lives in New York and works for the Dow Jones wire service.
I don’t think that the grade I got has any relevance to Anthony McKinney’s innocence.
When did you find out that they were subpoenaing your grades?
SW: I received a phone call last year from one of the states’ attorneys asking me informally about the class.
KC: A few months ago. Professor Protess emailed all of us about the subpoena and told us not to respond to any requests by the prosecution. He told us we were protected by the Shield Act.
What kind of questions did they ask you?
SW: They were mainly focused on what happened in the class itself. When did you get the syllabus? What was the standard for your grade? What kind of communication did you have with professor Protess? None of the questions were substantive questions about our investigation. The closest: who did you interview and how many times? There were no questions about specific pieces of evidence or findings.
How do you feel that your grades were subpoenaed?
SW: It’s ridiculous. I don’t think that the grade I got has any relevance to Anthony McKinney’s innocence. I think that the evidence I developed has relevance and that’s what the state should be focusing on and not the functional aspect of the class.
The people who are making these allegations are felons. Are we going to believe the felons over accomplished journalism students at Northwestern? I don’t think so.
KC: They’re trying to turn the information on us, when we haven’t done anything wrong. I don’t know why this was happening in our case and it wasn’t happening in all the others. This is an intimidation tactic. It’s a smear campaign. It’s just trying to make students look bad. I just think it’s a sideshow to be honest. Once the focus turns back to the facts I think everything will turn out.
What did you make of yesterday’s allegations? Was any of your investigation or reporting mentioned in the complaint?
SW: Not that I know of. Given my experience in the class, the way that it was conducted when I was there, and my perception of Professor Protess, the allegations seem to me to be completely false. In addition to the fact that it’s misguided, there’s some credibility issues here. Who has more credibility right now, the Medill Innocence Project or Chicago prosecutors? I think that people who are making these allegations are felons. Are we going to believe the felons over accomplished journalism students at Northwestern? I don’t think so.
Did you ever mistrust what any of the sources in the McKinney investigation told you?
KC: It was always hard to get people to talk to us. We had to work and build relationships with them. It’s not like when we would first talk to anybody that they would trust us because they didn’t know who we were or they thought we were with the police. Still, whenever we talked to people we would have to have multiple ways of confirming what they were saying.
SW: No.
Why not?
SW: I had no reason to. We made it clear what we were doing, that we were trying to find out the truth. I never had a reason to mistrust anything that anybody told us.
Why do you suppose Medill didn’t just comply with the subpoenas in the first place?
SW: Not only for future classes at Medill, but really any school, it sets a legal precedent for anyone who is doing investigative reporting that their stuff could get into the hands of the state. People who are thinking of taking this class might be wondering well if their grades and their emails will be fair game for the state. That might discourage people from even taking the class in the first place. Then if people take the class, they might act differently and be afraid to say things in email or whatnot.
KC: I personally don’t think we have anything to hide. I think Professor Protess thinks that it turns most of the focus on us versus the facts of the actual case. They have all the relevant interviews and everything that we’ve done.
This case has a lot of corroborating evidence. It’s not just Tony Drake. It’s not just his nephew.
Did you read the state prosecutor’s complaint? What did you make of the allegations?
KC: I think that they’re totally false. While I wasn’t at that interview, I know the kind of interview guidelines that we had. I have faith that the other members of my team that they would never pay a witness to say anything. I think it’s totally ridiculous.
If Tony Drake’s testimony is discredited, is the case still viable?
KC: I think that the case would still stand. It’s unfortunate that he would flip-flop what he was saying, but you can’t depend on one witness. This case has a lot of corroborating evidence. It’s not just Tony Drake. It’s not just his nephew. We had a lot of people back up what we’re saying. It’s three years of work. We definitely had other witness say that these were the alternative suspects. Professor Protess made sure we were on pretty solid ground before he turned the case over to lawyers.
Evan ben is the picture on the left