LANCASTER POST

The headline on its cover for June 6 reads: "Like Father, Like Son" and shows a man allegedly spiriting away copies of the Post from a Turkey Hill. He is identified as the father of one of the students whose picture was on the cover the week earlier .

WATCHDOG:

1) We congratulate the Post for being able to publish on time despite the distractions caused by F & M president John Fry and the college's combination Keystone Cops and thugs;

2) We had previously criticized the Post for naming the students;

3) We do not fault John Fry for endeavoring to have the young men accepted into a program that would keep them out of prison and ultimately allow them to expunge the record through restitution and public service, since NewsLanc has published articles indicating how the program serves all first time similar offenders; and

4) We think the public will be more sympathetic to the father than to the author of the front page stories, Ron Harper, Jr.

INTELLIGENCER JOURNAL

The Intell on June 5 reported "An F&M employee called campus security Tuesday afternoon, claiming she saw Harper walk up Fry's driveway and onto his front lawn, according to Antonucci."

WATCHDOG: Did the Intell reporter inquire whether the F & M employee was aware of the location of the public Right-Of-Way? Ron Harper, Jr. could well have been within the driveway, which connects with the street, and on the lawn in front of John Fry's residence, and yet been within the public road Right-Of-Way and therefore not trespassing.

Did the Intell reporter ask F & M Security Officers if they stopped to inquire of the F & M employee exactly where Harper was seen to determine if Harper had actually trespassed before going to the other side of Marietta Avenue to toss Harper to the ground and arrest him and Chris Hart Nibbrig?

Both the reporting and the 'policing' seem to be careless.

INTELLIGENCER JOURNAL

Intell June 5 headline: "F & M cops say man trespassed at home of President Fry"

WATCHDOG: The article concerning the inappropriate actions by F & M Security Officers in arresting and abusing media representatives is a masterpiece of slanting and innuendo seldom seen in the Lancaster press since the Convention Center controversy.

The article doesn't even once mention the Lancaster Post, thus not identifying with what periodical Chris Hart-Nibbrig and Ron Harper, Jr. are associated.

It was attributed to P. J. Reilly (who was not seen at the press conference) and the article was buried on B7 adjoining the Obituaries!

With academic end of year events swirling around F & M, is it possible that the Intell felt obliged to say something but didn't want to embarrass John Fry?

WGAL-TV

WGAL-TV: Silence re F & M Security Officers excesses

WATCHDOG: WGAL not "the one to count on"

What’s up, Channel 8?

1) You didn't bother attending the 2 p.m. Wednesday news conference held at Mulberry Art Studios where Ron Harper, Jr. and Christiaan A. Hart Nibbrig, co-publishers of Lancaster Post described their chilling arrest by the F&M Public Safety Officers. Two other TV stations were represented .

2) There was not a single word about this story on your 6 a.m. to 7 a.m. newscast.

3) By 7 a.m. this morning, the story was not posted on your web site.

When the First Amendment has been allegedly assaulted by local authority, this is a major story – and the WATCHDOG suggests it is more important than school yearbooks being printed with errors.

Are you indeed the "one to count on?"

INTELLIGENCER JOURNAL

Once again, this time in a June 2 editorial "Finding a home", the Intell states "...Lancaster County Commissioners...agreed to fund the position of a homeless advisor..."

WATCHDOG: What the Intell means is " the position of an advisor to the homeless." Homeless people should not be excluded from consideration, but we urge that the selection be made from a larger pool of applicants.

SUNDAY NEWS

SUNDAY NEWS of June 1: "If voters agree on Nov. 4, county government will become an entity shaped by the people. That's the rationale outlined by a majority of the Lancaster County Government Study Commission..."

WATCHDOG: Ed Rendell isn't King George. We are the people of the state as much as we are of the county.

Lancaster Post

LANCASTER POST, May 30, asks "One law for the rich and connected, another law for the rest of us?" The article goes on to reveal a burglary that took place when, in the middle of the night, celebrating F & M college students discovered a door left open at the Iron Hill Brewery and helped themselves to several bottles of liquor. As a side bar to the article, the Post reveals a letter from John Fry, President of F & M, "threatening legal action if Post News Editor, Ron Harper, Jr. stepped on F & M property."

WATCHDOG: Although in covering the story NewsLanc would have omitted the names of the students, the issue is legitimate as to whether the same relatively light punishment and opportunity to have their record expunged would have been offered to other young people under similar circumstances.

NewsLanc is not privy to what so offended Fry, but wonders if he overreacted. It is natural for him to want to protect students from potentially career altering consequences for a thoughtless college prank. But a free press also serves an important role in furthering democracy.

Perhaps even more culpable and subject to revocation of their liquor license is the Iron Hill Brewery. The Liquor Control Board would not take lightly a licensed outlet leaving a door open over night, especially one located under a college dormitory.

And also of interest, what was Fry thinking when he approved the location of a brewery restaurant on the ground floor of a college upper division housing unit?