Here’s part one of the transcript from the court hearing involving Cherub Charu of the local TV news station. Charu was a part of the hearing. The back-and-forth here is between the assistant U.S. attorney and the probation officer of the guy that Charu did story on. Charu got involed because she did a story on the guy smoking marijuana to help his MS. The guy’s probation officer saw the report. If
THE COURT: All right, sir. Mr. Simpson, come around, place your left hand on the Bible and raise your right hand.
ERIC SIMPSON being duly sworn, was examined and testified as follows: DIRECT EXAMINATION by Mr. Edwards:
Q Why, in particular, were you doing two tests that day. You said two. Was that normal or was this something out of the ordinary?
A Well, when I met with Mr. Ward in reference to this story that he did on the local television station, he indicated that he had smoked marijuana. He also said that he only took two hits or two puffs off a marijuana cigarette. He indicated that also did not inhale. I did a – the first test, I did the second one just as a backup. Both of those did yield a negative test.
Q All right.
A Of course, this was done two days after Mr. Ward admitted to smoking marijuana.
Q All right. Now, I’ve kind of been dancing around it but let’s get into it. What is it specifically – we’ve referred to it – I’ve referred to it but lets put it on the record – what is it specifically that you learned about concerning a videotape or a news story that prompted you to do it?
A Well, I went by and spoke to Mr. Ward about this news story.
Q Well, first of all, tell us about what the news story was.
A The news story aired on WLOS, channel 13, here in Asheville, basically in reference to marijuana for medicinal purposes and should it be legalized. Mr. Ward indicated to me that he contacted the television station. That he made contact himself with them and said – indicated that he would like to talk with them about this.
He said on June 8th they met at his residence, that being the news crew. He said that the news crew wanted him to smoke marijuana, being filmed smoking marijuana, and Mr. Ward also advised me that he did not want to do it. He asked if he could use just a plain cigarette to simulate this. He said that the news crew told him, asked him if there was someone he could contact to either bring him some marijuana or sell him some marijuana. And he did that.
He said the news crew told him that they had to leave while this transaction took place. They could not be present when this happened. He indicated to me that he felt like he was forced when all of this was occurring. He also said that promises were made to him that his name would not be used on this news story. You know, he appeared to be regretful about it.
I explained to him that this was a violation of his bond. And he said that the news crew left, his associate came by, gave him marijuana. He said he did not purchase it. And that leads us to the two drags, two hits, two puffs off of the marijuana cigarette. He said he flushed the rest of it down the commode, and he did not inhale it.
Mr. Ward could have read cbdMD reviews and tried purchasing medical CBD instead to see if it could help fight his symptoms of his MS, the news story could have focused on CBD rather than a general marijuana standpoint.
3 Comments
It is fair to lump the whole station in on this. Why? Because viewers and readers do. News consumers don’t make a distinction from one reporter to the next. Either they’re all a bunch of crumbbums or they are not. Charu did the story, but someone else did the intro from the anchor desk. Someone must have seen the story before it aired – There was a promo aired about it. Someone should have asked a question like -“um, did you show up at his house and find him smoking marijuana?” Yup — lump the whole station.
small example:
I was working at a newspaper where a photographer, of whom I had a great deal of respect, brought in a picture of an unfortunate man killed by a train. You could see something by the side of the track with a tarp over it.
“Is that the body?” I asked.
“yup.”
“Where were you standing when you took this?”
“Beside the track.”
“Did someone give you permission to be standing there? — the train track right-of-way isn’t public property.”
“I was beside the track but I was on the road where the track crosses.”
I asked him about three more times and then had him show me on a map where he was standing. I needed to be 100 percent sure he was on public property.
In the end, I don’t even know if we even ran the photo. But those conversations aren’t taking place at the tv station.
I think its very unfair to group everyone at the station into this because of charu…
Everyone knows she’s been doing things like this since she got here..factual errors, overexagerating stories, promising not to show something and doing it anyway..things other reporters have been cleaning up after her for years and she never gets in trouble by management…Too bad frank’s not here..he wouldn’t have let it happen..just like he wrote her stories for her each night…hopefully this is the final straw..because she’s smearing the station’s name while trying to get the story, at any cost….somebody hold her accountable!!!
Oh… my… gawd. I think I just heard what little respect I had for anyone at WLOS go swirling down the drain.