Editors always ask, 'When will the jury reach a verdict?'

Working for The Record on Sept. 11, 2001, Photographer Thomas E. Franklin captured this iconic image of three firefighters raising an American flag above the rubble of the Twin Towers. But the photo didn't appear on the Sept. 12, 2001, front page of The Record, then headquartered in Hackensack. However, Franklin's photo did show up on the cover of the New York Post on Sept. 13, 2001, missing any credit to him or The Record.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

If you're a reporter covering state or federal courts, you soon get used to stupid questions from the editors directing coverage in the newsroom.

"When is the jury coming back?" is an especially annoying question courthouse reporters hear -- in view of the jurors' secret deliberations.

You can bet editors asking stupid questions led to Page 1 stories today and Tuesday trying to predict what will happen at the federal trial of two former allies of Governor Christie in the George Washington Bridge lane closures three years ago.

On Tuesday, Staff Writer Paul Berger, who covers the Port Authority, weighed the chances of Bridget Anne Kelly and Bill Baroni, the former aides and confidants, being convicted -- like the 190 other men and women facing "federal charges in New Jersey in the past six years."

Today, Berger and Peter J. Sampson, who covers federal court in Newark for The Record, provide readers with another tutorial -- Jury Selection 101 (A-1).

The headlines are especially ridiculous, because the jurors are the triers of facts, and will decide the guilt or innocence of the defendants:

"Bridgegate
trial could 
hinge on
jury picks

"Judge's first challenge
is finding unbiased panel"

And on the continuation page:

"JURY: May swing GWB trial"

No. They definitely will "swing" the trial.

Bridgegate whitewash

A Bridgegate editorial appears on A-8, noting Christie once joked he moved the traffic cones himself to close access lanes to the bridge, triggering five mornings of gridlock in Fort Lee.

"Little would surprise New Jersey residents ... even if Christie's jest turned out to have been the truth."

And for the first time, The Record is calling the publicly funded $8 million report from a law firm that exonerated Christie "a whitewash."

New York skyline

The star of today's front page is the story on the renewal of the Manhattan skyline, part of The Record's coverage of the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on America (A-1).

Don't miss the centerfold by Staff Writer James M. O'Neill -- "REACHING NEW HEIGHTS" -- which amounts to a love letter from North Jersey residents who have watched the transformation of the skyline since the Twin Towers were leveled (A-4 and A-5). 

9/11 flag recovered

The story on recovery of the flag raised over the rubble of the World Trade Center recalls one of the darkest days in The Record's Hackensack newsroom, which was in use until 2009 (L-1).

The events had nothing to do with the terrorist attack itself or the column of black smoke rising from the rubble -- clearly visible through the big windows of the fourth-floor newsroom, where the staff had just put out an extra and were working on the morning edition of Sept. 12, 2001.

When the flag-raising photo captured by Staff Photographer Thomas E. Franklin was transmitted to the newsroom, the front page had already been made up with a photo showing pretty much what every other paper had -- an image of the smoking towers or a plane flying into one of them.

Photo Director Rich Gigli couldn't persuade Editor Frank Scandale and the woman he succeeded, Vivian Waixel, to put Franklin's photo on Page 1, because bean counters decided remaking the front page would be too expensive.

Franklin's photo ended up on a back page in the paper of Sept. 12, 2001, and that likely destroyed his chances of winning a Pulitzer Prize for Photography.

That same business mentality was used when The Record reprinted thousands of copies of the Sept. 11, 2001, extra without correcting a front-page photo caption that misidentified the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center.

Franklin's photo

In the years that followed, Jennifer A. Borg, then vice president and general counsel of The Record, jealously guarded the copyright of Franklin's iconic photo.

But that didn't stop the advertising department from inserting a glossy 8-inch-by-11-inch copy of the 9/11 flag-raising image into the paper one day.

On the flip side was an ad for All American Ford in Hackensack.

9/11 is all about selling cars

The New World Trade Center is a single tower reaching for the sky.

A decade ago, Editor Francis Scandale blew the chance of a lifetime to scoop his competition with a front page carrying a unique image of hope from Staff Photographer Thomas E. Franklin of The Record.

Today, amid all the 10th anniversary coverage in the Sunday paper, readers are given a copy of Franklin's photo showing three firefighters raising the American flag over the rubble of the World Trade Center on 9/11.

But the copyrighted photo -- roughly 8 by 10 inches on glossy paper stock -- is sponsored by a car dealer, and on the other side, readers find an ad for All American Ford on River Street, less than a mile from the old headquarters of The Record and North Jersey Media Group.

Is there some reason the NJMG Foundation couldn't sponsor a non-commercial distribution of Franklin's photo? How low can the Borgs go?

A week's reading

It will probably take a normal reader a week to plow through all the 9/11 anniversary coverage today, though some people will just take it straight to the recycling bin.

Many sections carry 9/11 stories, including Sports, which claims the attack on America "affected sports forever." What a hoot.

Then, there's a 20-page special section filled with the accounts of family members who lost someone on 9/11. Tim Nostrand, the Sunday/projects editor, refers to them as "survivors."

Front-page flop

Scandale gives Columnist Mike Kelly top billing on Page 1 today, and Kelly disappoints again. Would you get a load of that phony smile in Kelly's photo.

Kelly's first paragraph takes readers to Texas, where two survivors of 9/11 who once lived in New Jersey meet for dinner and .... I've lost interest already.

There are more 9/11 stories through Page A-9.

Local law-breakers

On the front of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes' Local section, Road Warrior John Cichowski, a former radio reporter, peddles a column about another radio reporter on 9/11.

The main element on the page is about a motorcycle club honoring a fallen Port Authority cop after more than 75 members broke the anti-noise ordinances of every town they rode through to get to the cemetery.

Praising Mac's pal

In Business, a glowing 16-inch story about real estate executive Jon F. Hanson makes no mention of his close relationship with Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg, chairman of North Jersey Media Group, or their joint ownership of a corporate jet (B-5).

In Better Living, Staff Writer Elisa Ung's Sunday column, The Corner Table, is supposed to be about challenges facing restaurant goers, but today she turns her back on readers again and writes about challenges facing a chef who runs a farm-to-table restaurant in far off Somerset County (F-1).

On the front of Opinion, readers find two self-serving columns by Kelly and Scandale on the experiences of reporters, editors, photographers and other journalists on 9/11.

Flawed journalist

Scandale's trite column is flawed from the outset, with a first paragraph that is awkwardly written and missing a word or two:

"Not in my wildest imaginations could I have envisioned what life would be like 10 years after the Twin Towers collapsed in the distance from my office window."

He meant to write that he saw the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan collapse from the window of his office on the fourth floor of the old newsroom in Hackensack.

But then Scandale isn't big enough to admit that he failed miserably as a journalist on 9/11, when he relegated Franklin's incredible flag-raising photo to a back page, instead of ordering the layout editors to tear up the front page to accommodate an image no other newspaper had.

"I remember our photo chief, Rich Gili, yelling, 'That's it!' when [P]hotographer Tom Franklin's now-famous image" appeared on the computer screen "where we retrieved our photos from the field."

Scandale doesn't tell readers Gili was waiting all day for a unique image that would advance the story for The Record and help the paper stand out among the competition, and he saw it in Franklin's photo.

Scandale also doesn't tell readers how he bowed to pressure from the bean counters, who told him it would cost too much to re-make the front page for Franklin's photo.

More than a decade after he joined the paper in early 2001, Scandale remains an uninspiring leader.

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