Shut Out

When the children of the YFZ ranch began to be reunited with their parents Monday, we got nothing. All of our contacts, all the trust we had built up in the community with our objective and fair reporting, all of it was worthless on Monday. After eight weeks on the ground, we got shut out at this important moment. I knew I was in trouble all day when I didn’t see the photographer from our competition at any of the places we were. He must be somewhere better, I figured. I texted him early in the day, asking how badly he was burning me. He texted back, asking if I had any sunscreen. I was dreading the journalistic beat-down that I knew was coming. Sure enough, this morning I find an amazing set of photographs documenting an FLDS family reunited with their children and moving into their new home. Emotional moments, hugs, kids playing joyfully. Just a bang-up job. And it’s not my work. What a letdown. After two months in Texas, this is definitely my lowest moment. To be shut out at such a critical moment? I could have been home with my family for the past two weeks. We’ve been covering the raid since day one. It’s a long time to live out of hotels and rental cars, away from our families. I’ve missed several important events at home and I don’t know how I make it up to my wife for all the load she has carried while I’ve been here in Texas. But we knew we were covering history down here. And that was important. We took our jobs seriously and put together some of the best coverage on the raid, hands down. Brooke’s reporting was consistently ahead of everyone, even yesterday when we were the only ones to catch Judge Walther at the courthouse seating a grand jury to consider criminal charges in Eldorado. That’s why being shut out for the reunions stings so much. We thought we had built up some good relationships, while at the same time maintaining our objectivity. Others didn’t even try to be fair. Some reporters bought the state’s case hook, line, and sinker and never even tried to be fair. Others went the other way; I saw one reporter sit with the FLDS members in court, as if she was one of them. Neither approach felt right to me. We wanted the truth no matter where it took us. We kept hearing that the reunions needed to be private moments and the children were just too emotionally damaged to have us present. But the family in the photos that I saw this morning was quite comfortable with having a reporter and photographer present. In fact, the article says that one of the boys, a six-year-old, insisted on helping the photographer and even took pictures with his camera. I have been that photographer dozens of times over the years as I have photographed families in sensitive situations. A good photojournalist blends right in and puts people at ease. But if we don’t have any access, history is lost.