September 18, 2011
1. Situation
Imagine you are a reporter for a little time paper and are in need of a story. You have a tip that a local business is participating in some shady business. As a reporter looking to report the truth you decide to turn in a resume with enhanced information. This allows you to get first hand knowledge on what truly happens inside the business. Turns out that you are right, the company illegally dumping their waste. You report this story in your paper and the company reiceves negative media attention resulting from the story. The company is suing you.
2. Legal Background
Food Lion Inc. vs Capital Cities/ABC Inc. had a sitituation very similar to this when two reporters went undercover to expose the mishandling of food. Food Lion sued on the basis of unfair trade practices, fraud, and breach of contract. The district court ruled in favor of Food Lion and ruled the two reporters had committed fraud by using false resumes. The circiut court overturned that decision saying that the reporters had not committed fraud by saying the contract signed upon employment stated either party could terminate employment at anytime for any reason. The resumes that were false were ruled to be irrelevant.
3 Questions
Is is ethical as a reporter to gain information under false precidences?
Should the first amendment protect aquiring information after falsifying information?
Do you believe the company in the sitiuation has a legal case against you as a reporter?
3 thoughts on “Resume Trouble?”
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September 23rd, 2011 at 10:53 am
I think it was ethical for the reporter to gain the information because it was Food Lion’s fault for not checking up on the reporter’s information that was stated on the resume. If a company fails to look at a potential employee’s background, that’s more unethical on their part because people walk through their doors with false resumes everyday and it’s the company’s job to weed out the fake ones.
I think that the First Amendment should protect acquiring information after falsifying information because otherwise, companies have the easy method of just suing reporters after they falsify information in order to gain more knowledge on the company’s wrongdoing instead of looking into everyone’s resume a little deeper. Therefore, Food Lion doesn’t have a legal case against the reporter because they were at fault for not checking the reporter’s information more closely and probably many more of their employee’s resumes more closely.
September 23rd, 2011 at 8:24 pm
I do not believe that the company has a legal case against the reporters because reporters are loyal to a different set of ethics. Unfortunately by following journalistic ethics they interfered with Food lions regulations. I think Food Lion was mostly upset because they got caught. Lets say that the turnout was positive and they reported on story on how fresh the meat was and how amazing that Food Lion staff was. I highly doubt that that they would be worried about fraud and breach of contract. Plus if they looked at their applicants a little more thoroughly this would have never happened.
December 14th, 2011 at 11:57 am
Clarification: the circuit did dismiss the fraud claim, but upheld the breach of duty and trespassing claims. http://www.ajr.org/article.asp?id=3132