Someone's Afraid of the Truth

by Craig Gingold
May 14, 2001

Listeners to today's Democracy Now! broadcast heard an in-depth discussion with British journalist Andrew Gumbel about the Oklahoma City bombing case, focusing on the recent revelation of massive suppression of documents by the  FBI and the possibility that Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols were part of a larger conspiracy of extreme right-wing elements -- contrary to the case that was presented by the prosecution.

As Amy Goodman herself announced on-air at the beginning of the program, the final segment was to be an interview with forensic artist Jeannie Boylan, who was called in by the FBI to do the original composite sketches -- a woman who has not previously gone on record about what she learned. She was going to speak about the case publicly for the very  first time. Instead, listeners around the country heard an interview with Charles Kernaghan about Salvadoran sweatshop abuses -- a very important issue, to be sure -- but NOT what was originally scheduled for the final segment of the program.

Restore Free Speech at WBAI. April 28, 2001 © Copyright, Diane Greene Lent, 2001

The reason?

According to Amy Goodman, arrangements for the interview (presumably via telephone) had been made -- but it never took place because she was expelled from the broadcast studio at WBAI by the interim general manager, Utrice Leid.

This was revealed on the air on KPFA during a fund-raising segment with KPFA's  station manager, Jim Bennett -- undoubtedly Amy's only opportunity to inform listeners about this latest appalling interference by Pacifica management. She sounded truly aghast at the loss of this crucial interview. Hopefully Ms. Boylan will agree to reschedule the interview very soon. No further details about the incident were discussed on the air.

Editor's note: To my knowledge, Jennie Boylan has never been on.