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Panel recalls FBI, AJC roles in case of Richard
Jewell, Olympics bombing hero turned suspect
LOCAL MEMORIES OF A TERRORIST’S BOMBING SPREE
Continued from page 9
ing about people,” and that his favorite
part of “The Suspect” was learning more
about Jewell as a person.
“He had become a public character in
a story that had this extremely bizarre
twist and also at the same time [was] the
biggest story on Earth,” Roughton said in
defense of the Jewell investigation scoop.
“... I still believe that we did the right thing.
We had an American citizen who was be
ing pursued by the full apparatus of the
American government in some way. And
this is debatable, but I would argue that
we have an obligation to put some day
light on that.”
But that doesn’t mean the editing and
publication process was easy. Roughton
was one of several AJC staffers involved
before then Managing Editor John Walter
made the decision to publish.
“It was a very difficult discussion, I
have to say,” Roughton said. “Part of what
I want to personally be careful about is
not becoming defensive... There are a lot
of good questions around what we did at
the time, and I think there are good jour
nalistic questions about that, and those
are important. And I think in the world
we live in, they’re more important now
than they may even have been then.”
Roughton disputed Alexander and Sal-
wen’s repeated statements that Scruggs’
source was a leaker inside the FBI. Scrug
gs and co-reporter Ron Martz never re
vealed their sources, even when threat
ened with jail time in a subsequent libel
lawsuit, and Roughton wouldn’t, either.
“I won’t even acknowledge that there’s
an FBI source, if there was one,” he said,
though adding the source had “very deep
firsthand knowledge of the FBI.”
Debate over the AJC’s role comes down
to whether the paper was too uncritical
in reporting a mistaken suspicion. Alex
ander said the AJC was not aware that
the FBI had other suspects as well. It was
when all FBI officials stopped talking to
the media that the AJC scored another
scoop. Rankin, the AJC reporter, found
that Jewell did not have time to both plant
the bomb and to reach a pay phone used
by the bomber to make a warning call.
With officials not talking about the inves
tigation, “that was the only reporting we
could do,” Roughton said, and it helped to
lead to Jewell’s exoneration.
Jewell soon filed libel lawsuits against
several major media outlets, including the
AJC, CNN and NBC News. In a long and
fierce case involving prominent Buck-
head attorney L. Lin Wood, among others,
the AJC finally emerged victorious in 2011
and was the only media outlet not to set
tle with Jewell or his estate.
While security guard Richard Jew
ell was briefly suspected of the 1996 At
lanta Olympics bombing, the real per
petrator was right-wing terrorist Eric
Rudolph. After the Olympics, Rudolph
went on to bomb an LGBTQ nightclub
in Atlanta and two medical clinics that
performed abortions, one in Alabama
and one in Sandy Springs. The Sandy
Springs bombing on Jan. 16,1997, at an
office building at 275 Carpenter Drive,
was the first use of his tactic of setting
off a delayed second bomb in an at
tempt to kill first responders. He was
captured in the North Carolina moun
tains in 2003 and is serving a life sen
tence in a federal “supermax” prison.
Here are some memories about the
Olympics and Sandy Springs bomb
ings. If you have memories you would
like to share, email editor@report-
ernewspapers.net and we may use
them in a future story.
Centennial Olympic Park bombing
MITCH LEFF
Then: Public relations rep for Olym
pics sponsors; Now: President and
CEO, Leff & Associates public relations
I was working for a local public rela
tions agency, representing several ma
jor Olympic sponsors. That day was
a busy one and I had fallen asleep on
my couch with the TV on when I got
a call from a friend checking to see
if I was OK. She thought I was work
ing down at Centennial Olympic Park
that night. Initially, Jewell was hailed
as a hero for getting people away from
the bomb and I was part of the team
that was fielding media calls and set
ting up interviews with him. That
lasted for a day or so. When he was
named a suspect, we had to stop.
Sandy Springs bombing
STEVE ROSE
Then: Fulton County police officer;
Now: Retired Sandy Springs
police captain
My car was there, but I was not. I left
a day earlier on vacation to Lake Tahoe.
At the time, I was assigned as securi
ty for Fulton Commission Chairman
Mitch Skandalakis. He told my sub to
take him to the bomb site. They parked
beside another car near a dumpster.
They were standing in the parking lot-
when a second bomb went off in or
next to the dumpster. The car next to
mine took the brunt of it, but the blast
was so strong my car assumed it was
a collision and activated the fuel shut
off valve, disabling the car from start
ing. That Crown Vic never worked right
again.
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