Arthur Hailey - Evening News

Ideas and exchanges continued flowing back and forth. The working alliance of a line producer and tape editor had been described as a duet. It often was.

Within the process, though, the possibilities for prejudice and distortion were infinite. Individuals could be shown doing things out of sequence. A political candidate, for example, might be seen laughing at the sight of homeless people when in reality he had wept, the laughter having occurred earlier and been directed at something else. Using a technique known as "slipping audio,” sound or speech could be transposed from one scene to another, with only an editor and producer knowing of the change. When such things were about to be done, a correspondent who happened to be in an editing room was asked to leave. The correspondent might guess what was intended but prefer not to know.

Officially such practices were frowned on, though they happened at all networks.

Iris had once asked Bob Watson if he ever let his political prejudices—known to be strongly socialist—influence his editing. He answered, "Sure, at election times if I think I can get away with it. It ain't hard to make someone look good, bad or downright ridiculous, providing the producer goes along.”

"Don't ever try it with me,” Iris had said, "or you'll be in trouble.”

Watson had touched his forehead in mock salute.

Now, continuing with the White Plains report, Iris suggested, "Try that shot with the doughnut effect.”

"It's better—Oh, goddamn that inconsiderate schmuck!” The head of a still photographer had popped up, ruining the video shot, a reminder of a perpetual war between press photographers and TV camera crews.

At one point, pictures on the master tape didn't fit the sound track. Watson said, "We need Harry to change some words.”

"He will. Let's finish our stuff first.”

Watson chafed over limiting to three seconds the length of several shots.”In British TV news they let their shots run five; you can build a mood that way, use sound to help. Did you know the Brits have a longer attention span than we do?”

"I've heard people say so.”

"Over here, if you use five-second shots more than occasionally, twenty million assholes'll get bored and change channels.”

When they took a few minutes' break for coffee and Watson had a fresh cigar going, Iris asked him, "How did you get into this?”

He chuckled.”If I told you, you wouldn't believe.”

"Try me."

"I lived in Miami, was the night janitor for a local TV station. One of the young news guys who was on at night saw I was interested and showed me how the edit machines worked; that was back when they were using film, not tape. After that, I'd work like hell to get the cleaning work done fast, Come three or four in the morning, I'd be in an edit room splicing yesterday's outtakes they'd thrown away, putting stories together. After a while I guess I got good.”

"So what happened.”

"One time in Miami, while I was still a janitor, there was a race riot. It was at night. Everything was going wild, a lot of the black area, Liberty City, burning up. The TV station I worked for had called in all its people, but some had trouble getting through. They didn't have a film editor, needed one real bad.”

Iris said, "So you volunteered.”

"At first, nobody'd believe I could do it. Then they got desperate and let me try. Right away, my stuff was going on air. They sent some to the network. The network used it all next day. I stayed on the job ten hours. Then the station manager came in and fired me.”

"Fired you!”

"As a janitor. Said I was goofing off, didn't have my mind on my work.” Watson laughed.”Then he hired me as an editor. Haven't looked back since.”

"That's a lovely story,” Iris said.”When I write my book someday, I'll use it.”

Soon after, at Watson and Iris's suggestion, Partridge changed some words of commentary to match the editing and Watson slipped the rerecording in. Partridge also recorded a final standup for the piece, facing a camera on the street outside the CBA News building.

Since returning from White Plains, Partridge had thought deeply, at moments agonized, about what he would say. If this had been a normal news story a summation would have been easy. What made this story different was Crawford Sloane's involvement. Some of the words he had considered using would, Partridge knew, bring anguish to Crawf. So should he soften them, waffle just a little, or be the hard-nosed newsman with a single standard—objectivity?

In the end, the decision simply happened. Outside the CBA News building, with a camera crew waiting and curious pedestrians watching, Partridge scribbled the sense of what he would say, then, memorizing the notes, ad-libbed.

"The events in White Plains today—a monstrous tragedy for that city's innocent victims—is also the worst of news for my friend and colleague, Crawford Sloane. It means, without doubt, that his wife, young son and father are in the hands of savage, merciless outlaws, their identities and origins unknown. The only thing clear is that whatever their motives, they will stop at nothing to achieve them.

”The nature and timing of the crime at White Plains also raise a question which many are now asking: Have the kidnap victims by this time been removed from the United States and conveyed to some distant place, wherever that may be?

"Harry Partridge, CBA News, New York..”

Teddy Cooper was wrong. The kidnappers and their victims had not left the United States. However, according to present plans, a few more hours would see them gone.

For the Medellin group still holed up at Hackensack on Saturday afternoon, tension was at a peak, nerves stretched to their limit. The immediate cause for concern was radio and TV reports about that morning's events at White Plains.

Miguel, restless and anxious, snapped back answers to questions from the others, several times swearing at those who asked them. When Carlos, usually the mildest of the five Colombian men, suggested angrily that booby-trapping the Nissan van with explosives had been una idea, Miguel snatched up a knife. Then, gaining control of himself, he put it down.

In truth, Miguel knew that booby-trapping the passenger van at White Plains had been a bad mistake. The intention was to provide a harsh warning about the kidnappers' seriousness, after they had gone.

After was the operative word.

Miguel had been confident that because of changes in the van's appearance made following the kidnap—eliminating the dark windows and switching from New Jersey to New York license plates—it would remain unnoticed in the White Plains parking garage for five or six days, perhaps much longer.

Clearly, his judgment had been wrong. Worse, that morning's explosion and aftermath had refocused national attention on the Sloane family's kidnappers and raised police and public alertness to a peak, just when they were ready to steal quietly out of the country.

Neither Miguel nor the others cared in the least about the deaths and general mayhem at White Plains. In other circumstances they would have been amused. They cared only to the extent that they themselves were now in greater peril and it need not have occurred.

The conspirators at Hackensack batted questions back and forth: Would police roadblocks, which according to news reports had eased since Thursday, be reinstated? If so, would there be one or more between the hideaway and Teterboro Airport? And what about the airport? Would security be tighter because of the new alert? And even if the four who were going, plus captives, managed to leave Teterboro safely in the private Learjet, what of the stop at Florida's Opa Locka Airport? How great was the danger there?