“I’m again disappointed in the ongoing selective and incendiary ‘reporting’ on April 22 by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution” Future training center task force meetings to be open (ajc.com) writes a retired, high-ranking Atlanta Police Department officer to InsiderAdvantage.
He is writing to us after failing to get a response from his message to new AJC Editor Leroy Chapman, and he has written quite a fact-checking critique about the style, content and omissions by a reporter named Riley Bunch.
As for style, the disgusted veteran officer writes: “The reporter inserts incendiary and unrelated information between sentences related to the primary subject: ‘Future Training Center Task Force Meetings to be Open.’ There is not a continuous thread of information presented to the reader. I suppose one reason for this style choice is to generate interest and ensure the reader continues to follow the emotional story. I find this writing style disjointed and disappointing. The article jumps from statements by (Georgia NAACP head) Gerald Griggs, to “the coroner wrote that gunshot residue was ‘not seen’ on (Manuel) Teran’s hands…,” then finally getting back to Mayor Andre Dickens’ comments and the subject of the article. The reporter repeats past AJC reporting by stating the “coroner wrote that gunshot residue was not seen on Teran’s hands.” (Publisher’s note: Law enforcement officers were trying to arrest the armed radical and others hiding in a forest at the police training center construction site.)
Then our police veteran “fact-checker” shifts into high gear:
“I was an APD homicide detective. I never observed gunshot residue on a victim or perpetrator. Obviously close range and contact gunshot wounds have significant stippling (tattooing) and powder residue around the entrance wounds. But trace gunshot primer/residue on the hands and clothing of the person firing a gun is not visible to the human eye without magnification, enhanced lighting and chemical processing to collect the material. This trace evidence is collected using solvent swabs from GSR (Gun Shot Residue) kits that are examined at the crime lab using microscopes, lasers and spectrometry to detect trace elements.”
“Multiple factors can prevent the collection of such evidence,” he continues, “including the presence of blood, dirt, clothing, etc. Courts have repeatedly held that the absence of the detected presence of such primer and powder residue does not prove that a firearm was not discharged. When Teran’s body was examined by the DeKalb Medical Examiner, consistent with best practices for evidence recovery, the hands were enclosed in bags. The medical examiner report confirms that he performed the GSR solvent tests, and these tests were sent to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for analysis.”
Then the “fact-checker” refers to the omission factor:
“Omitted from the reporting is the fact that the 9mm projectile recovered from the torso of the wounded Georgia state trooper was fired from a 9mm firearm recovered at the scene. The GBI released records that this handgun was purchased by Teran in 2020. These source documents, reported by other news outlets, were informative.
“There has been almost NO reference by the AJC to the firearm that was purchased by Teran, no reference to the confirmation that the projectile recovered from the wounded state trooper matched Teran’s firearm. And I must ask if the report by the GBI confirms that the GSR testing indicates the presence of gunshot residue on the hands or clothing of Teran, will the AJC repeatedly report this as often as it has reported information sympathetic to Teran?
By the way, our writer notes that omitted from AJC reporting is that the law enforcement officers entering this construction site/forest area were on high alert given past violent attacks on police, recent riots in downtown Atlanta attributed to these radicals and past assaults at this location on police officers with gasoline firebombs, fireworks, rocks and bottles. “They had every reason to expect significant violent resistance,” he writes. “I’ve heard that law enforcement was aware of credible reports that the protesters were armed. The wounding of the state trooper, the discovery of a hidden cache of weapons and discovery of booby traps in this area have confirmed these threats.”
He concludes: “Omitted was the fact that Teran was a premeditated armed trespasser, and willingly participated in an extended unlawful protest after multiple warnings. This seems an obvious fact to be included to balance the other text that is more sympathetic to the deceased.”
After all, as Atlanta’s police chief said after the Teran confrontation, when a firearm is used against trained law enforcement officers, it is reasonable that they will return fire until certain the threat has ended.
Finally, our retired police veteran writer has a message to the AJC editor: “I would appreciate more source document links included in AJC reporting and, please, more facts, more balance and less style and biased reporting.”
