His name would’ve surfaced one way or the other,” Roughton said. And if anyone believes that Richard Jewell’s name would not have been brought up to the public within 24 hours one way or another or dependent on whether we decided to hold our story, wasn’t paying attention. At that time we decided to name Richard Jewell. I think it’s absolutely debatable, and I think it’s a great debate to have of when to name people, when we shouldn’t. “We had an accurate story verified completely that was on a very important public issue involving the public coming down on this one guy. Roughton defended his decision making at the time of choosing to publish the Jewell story and naming him as a suspect as “completely reasonable,” and he says he’s heard “second guessing” from critics for the last 23 years. had no comment for this story, and Ray did not immediately respond.Īlso Read: Olivia Wilde on 'Richard Jewell': 'I Did Not Have a Say' in Portrayal of Female Reporter And by the way, I will stand by every word and assertion in the script.” The movie isn’t about Kathy Scruggs it’s about the heroism and hounding of Richard Jewell, and what rushed reporting can do to an innocent man. They deflect and distort…opting to challenge one assertion in the movie rather than accepting their own role in destroying the life of a good man. And what do they decide to do? They launch a distraction campaign. Now a movie comes along 23 years later, a perfect chance for the AJC to atone for what they did to Richard and to admit to their misdeeds. And this was after he had saved hundreds of lives. They compared him to noted mass murderer Wayne Williams. “The AJC hung Richard Jewell, in public,” Ray said. “They editorialized wildly and printed assumptions as facts. However, on Thursday, Ray spoke to Deadline and said the AJC was deflecting by focusing on “one single minute in a movie that’s 129 minutes long” and criticized the AJC for its reporting at the time. Much of the debate has concerned a moment in the film that suggests Scruggs had sex with an FBI agent in order to get a story tip on Jewell, something the AJC and Roughton say there is no evidence to support. If he wants to take on our decision making or take me on or our managing editor, whomever, he should do that, but that’s not what he did in this film.” I think his assertion is absolutely specious. The decision of whether to publish that or name Jewell was not up to Kathy. “Kathy was doing her job, bringing in a story independent of that. “If Billy Ray had wanted to write a screenplay that took on the newspaper as an institution and the editors of the newspaper, including me and named me and attacked me and characterized me, that would be one thing, because I can defend myself,” Roughton told TheWrap. The paper ultimately defended and won the lawsuit. Neither she nor Jewell are around to comment on – or defend – their depiction in the film.Īlso Read: Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff 'Appalled' by 'Richard Jewell' Portrayal of Reporter, Journalism Scruggs died in 2001 of a drug overdose after years of depression that resulted from the paper being sued by Jewell for defamation. “Richard Jewell” screenwriter Billy Ray is getting pushback from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution editor of reporter Kathy Scruggs, saying that Ray damaged the reputation of a woman “who can’t do anything at all now to recover” it.īert Roughton, who was Scruggs’ editor in verifying her reporting on the Jewell case during the 1996 Olympics, took issue with Clint Eastwood’s film for specifically criticizing and naming her, rather than himself, other managing editors or the news outlet as a whole.
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