NJMG fires reporter over story on bullying

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The Record of Woodland Park on Wednesday started a three-part series on bullying even though some believe there is at least one bully on the North Jersey Media Group payroll.

North Jersey Media Group fired a freelance reporter after she wrote about cyberbullying for one of its weekly newspapers, AIM Vernon in Sussex County.

On Wednesday, The Record of Woodland Park started a three-part series on bullying, and the focus of Thursday's Page 1 piece is cyberbullying. The first part drew this comment on northjersey.com, the publishing company's Web site:

Wednesday March 30, 2011, 3:19 PM - RosieLee says:
"North Jersey Media Group fired a reporter two weeks ago after they published her article on bullying and the bullies called and threatened to sue the newspaper. Now they are doing a series on bullying? Seems ironic and hypocritical in my opinion."

A source familiar with the firing told Eye on The Record: 

"Jessica Zummo, a wonderful reporter for one of their weekly publications, did an article on cyberbullying by adults. She named two people in her article and had a significant amount of documentation to back up her article. The people she named in the article called [NJMG Corporate Attorney] Dina Sforza repeatedly and threatened to sue the paper, if they [NJMG] didn’t fire the reporter. Even though the editor approved the article and even helped the reporter with it, Sforza berated the reporter terribly. NJMG then fired the reporter. This happened about two weeks ago."

Zummo worked as a freelance reporter for AIM Vernon for about four years, and was paid $50 a story. I was told she was the weekly paper's only reporter.


Here are links to a Facebook page and a Web site:


Inside Vernon

 www.insidevernon.com

Today's paper 

The move of The Record's newsroom to Woodland Park from Hackensack -- along with all the employees who spurn a healthy lifestyle -- hurt Passaic County in a survey of the healthiest counties in New Jersey (A-1).

Deirdre, Tim, Liz, Elisa -- you know who you are. Key factors in the rankings include obesity, binge drinking and access to healthy foods.

Even though she ignores virtually all other news about Hackensack, reporter Monsy Alvarado is a day late on a ruling by a federal judge who dismissed claims in a lawsuit filed by two police officers (A-11).

Resident kvetch

In a letter to the editor on A-12, Mickey Applebaum of Cliffside Park complains about the increasing number of Korean signs in neighboring Fort Lee on "establishments ... that exclude most of the public."

Hey, Mickey, many of those "private, money making operations" are restaurants and catering stores that would welcome you with open arms.

Fashionista

You can just guess at the sad state of local news by the daily coverage of a woman's lawsuit against her plastic surgeon, and the huge photo of the plaintiff on the front of Local, the section that is head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes' pride and joy.

The well-groomed woman, who lives in Bloomingdale and apparently shops at Bloomingdale's, could serve as an example to Sykes, Liz Houlton and other fashion-challenged editors who have bad-hair days every day.

Unfortunately, Staff Writer John Petrick reports the $115,000 jury award without telling readers the plaintiff will be lucky if she sees half of that -- once her lawyer deducts his 33% contingent fee, plus expenses for any investigation, expert witnesses, exhibits and so forth.

More chest thumping from JerryD

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Here is the comment Jerry DeMarco wrote after my last post. The former assistant assignment editor and breaking news editor for The Record has always been full of bluster, but just how much of what he says can we really believe? And isn't he trying to gloss over incidents of sexual harassment of several women he supervised?

DeMarco has boasted of sleeping with women high and low. His pursuit and harassment of women were well-known to his supervisor, head Assignment Editor Deirdre "Laughs A Lot" Sykes, who sat next to him and saw on his desk the photo of the news clerk who was about half  of DeMarco's age when he dated her.

His activities also were well-known to Dina Sforza, corporate attorney for North Jersey Media Group, and Jennifer A. Borg, NJMG vice president and general counsel. Yet as far as I know, De Marco was never disciplined, despite an explicit company policy against sexual harassment.

These three women didn't even stand up for the young women who were being exploited by him.

Here is what DeMarco said:

Horniness requires a pulse, Veektor. And what's wrong with having attractive QUALIFIED women on your staff? People always accused me of deliberately hiring hot babes -- oh, like one who came in with a Pulitzer and others who've gone on to much greater accomplishments, like NG and LK and the dazzlingly talented AK (even though I brought in KM, PL and PP, among other dudes). Admittedly, the honey wasn't as sweet once MT left, although AH took up the slack before bolting, as well (I can say that, cause I dated both). Then again, neither was a reporter. Nor are MH and KM -- both of them gorgeous inside and out, and more skilled than you and me put together, bud. So what if MK -- my all-time crush and the sexiest woman in journalism not named Rachel Sklar -- happens to work there? Or the blinding SA? (Sorry, SB. Just statin' fact.) The joint has some good-looking men, as well. I'm sure. I think. No? OK, since I left the male hottie level has dropped considerably, but what did you expect? Losing OC on the distaff side was a blow -- although those of us lucky to be her FB friends get to share each and every smooch and cuddle as she and new hubby J.P. Gotrocks III trot the globe (Were he and Peter Sellers separated at birth?). In fact, unless there've been defections from Hooters, I don't think the sexual tension is anywhere near what it used to be -- at least not since skunk hair and Pearl White were caught canoodling on the Great Lawn. My guess is there are more clock blockers than heart stoppers. Which reminds me: Is K Five Cents still there?

January 28, 2010 2:27 PM

Victor E. Sasson said...

To readers: Your assignment, if you wish to accept it, is identifying all the people here now named only with initials. Victor Sasson

January 28, 2010 6:04 PM

The Record v. 'Eye on The Record'

A lawyer for North Jersey Media Group, which publishes The Record, has asked me to remove the 9/11 flag-raising photo I used in an earlier post, "Major detour on the road to a Pulitzer Prize," claiming the photo is copyrighted. Isn't that rich?

The editors of The Record thought so little of this dramatic image on the day of the suicide attacks -- even though it was taken by their own photographer, Thomas E. Franklin -- they relegated it to a back page, a huge error of  judgment that probably doomed Franklin's chance of winning a Pulitzer Prize.

In any case, I have substituted a photo of the World Trade Center in the post.

Dina Sforza, the NJMG lawyer, also contacted my lawyer, Joshua L. "Josh" Weiner in Morristown, and threatened to file a lawsuit unless I take down this blog.