Austin News Station Hammered For Serial Bombing Coverage

AUSTIN, TX — In the rush to report big news fast, media often make mistakes as editors' demands intensify under deadline or unsubstantiated reports are issued before being properly vetted. Critiques of serial bombing coverage by one Austin news station is particularly intense.

KVUE is being roundly criticized on two major fronts. A crew descended on the home of the bomber's family at around 5 a.m., breaking the news their loved one was the bomber before police had an opportunity to do so — all the while taping the exchange with beleaguered family members. Following that, the closed caption service the station uses for its broadcasts referred to an African American bombing victim as "this monkey" during a Tuesday evening news broadcast.

The racial slur occurred during a KVUE report about Draylen Mason, a 17-year-old killed March 12 during the terror campaign that also injured his mother. The closed captioning referred to the victim as "this monkey," an error the firm blamed on an algorithm in a statement.

Related story: Austin Bombings: How You Can Help Victims' Families

KVUE officials assured viewers they had cut ties with the firm that provides closed captioning after they were made aware of the issue, according to a prepared statement.

"As of March 22, after finding a replacement closed captioning provider, KVUE has severed ties with closed captioning provider VITAC due to the terrible mistake in our breaking news coverage Tuesday evening," KVUE officials wrote on their website. "Many of our viewers have asked why this wasn’t an immediate decision, and we want you to know that we’ve been working as fast as possible to secure a replacement to this service while adhering to FCC guidelines."

Colorado-based VITAC officials issued a prepared statement of their own: "The unfortunate error which occurred was neither intentional, nor is it a regular or acceptable occurrence in the delivery of our services. As a group of professionals we at VITAC are resolutely serious in our commitment to provide, accurate essential accessibility services for the Deaf and Hard Of Hearing community and we are embarrassingly disappointed that we failed to do so today."

Officials categorized the error as a typo blaming the "mis-captioning" on a complex algorithm used to help provide the simultaneous typing of broadcasters' uttered words.

"While we strive for perfection unfortunately we did not achieve that today," VITAC officials wrote. "However although this was not intentional, it is not acceptable and for this we sincerely apologize. The complex algorithms utilized from the technology perspective will, in rare instances, result in an error in delivering a key word, name or phrase either contextually or alphabetically."

Some people in Austin had called for boycotting the station as a result of the purported snafu unless the station cut ties with VITAC, the nation's largest provider of closed captioning. As the station worked to sever its connection with the firm, KVUE said it was "heartsick" over what was categorized as a "terrible error."

See the full statements from KVUE and VITAC by clicking here.

On another front, the station's news-gathering tactics has given rise to a community debate on media ethics. Upon identifying the serial bombers as Mark Anthony Conditt, a news crew rushed to his family's home seeking comment before they had been informed by police of their loved one's death and the crimes with which he was posthumously accused.

After alerting the bomber's next of kin to his death, Police publicly said Conditt was the person behind a three-week campaign of terror involving parcel bombs that left two people dead and several injured. The crime spree came to an end early Wednesday when Conditt detonated a bomb on himself to avoid police capture. The news station chose to run video of their early morning exchange with family members as they learned Conditt had been identified as the serial bomber as the filming crew broke the news to them.

All along, the camera rolled to record reactions of family members they later aired. The footage has since been removed from the station's website with a second explanation:

"Editor's note: We recognize the community's concerns about our coverage of the suspect bomber's family. Our goal is always to report accurately and compassionately. Upon reflection, we've concluded it was unnecessary to publish our exchange our with the family, so we've removed the video from this article. We learn from every story, and we learned from this one. We always appreciate feedback, even when it's tough to read."

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