Last night as Alex Thomson presented More4 News live from the City, a man pushed his way in front of the camera.
After being asked to stop and pulled firmly out of frame the man became quite violent. He pushed the presenter with some force and then turned his aggression onto the camera, causing the live broadcast to go off air.
This was the second incident of the day during a live broadcast. Earlier a man had lurched in front of the camera while pulling a face and was shoved out of the way by Alex Thomson who said ‘excuse me sir’.
It’s sad that reporters can’t do their job on the streets of our cities without being subjected to this. Hopefully it won’t deter live reports on location in the future.
Updated: 14 April 2008
The YouTube copy of this incident has been removed due to a ‘copyright complaint’ from ITN, which makes More4 News (and Channel 4 News), and I see that the clip has also disappeared from the Channel 4 News site itself. Which could be a sign that some legal action is pending.
Last week a second video clip of the police assault on Ian Tomlinson was release by ITN. More4 News has confirmed to me that the clip did come from the video camera that was damaged in the attack on Alex Thomson. It had taken technicians some time to recover it from the broken camera.
Many activists and protesters are highly critical of what they see as the ‘mainstream media’ and also of police tactics at demonstrations. It’s ironic that a protestor came near to destroying what could be crucial evidence of the assault on Ian Tomlinson by a riot policeman.
Note also the huge amount of coverage for the video by the ‘citizen journalist’ with some articles failing to mention at all that the second significant clip exists and was produced by ITN.
All just part of the hype… I have written more about this here.
4 Comments
The problem is that journalists really did overstep the mark at the G20 protests in order to get a good photo and I am sure history will note this well. One focus of the anger is the media itself so it is not surprising the mainstream news crews will become targets themselves, especially with all their poor reporting and the pushing and shoving as human shields between the protesters and the police.
g7uk.com: Not all reporting has been bad and some seems balanced. For instance, The Times reports:
‘it is the story of how the police wilfully criminalised and alienated 4,000 innocent people’
I saw live coverage of the violent minority of protesters at 1pm on BBC News and Sky. At that time the police weren’t wearing riot gear and weren’t reacting to the considerable abuse (one was hit over the head with a 4ft pole).
But if you go to IndyMedia you’ll be hard pressed to find any mention of violence by protestors. It’s all about the police. So who is being selective about the facts?
It isn’t fair to tar all journalists with the same brush and, out of all them, possibly Channel 4 News is the least deserving recipient for any backlash. Also, these days, many technical people are poorly-paid freelancers who own their own equipment. So attacking the camera is especially mean and pointless.
But anyway I don’t accept that the kind of thing that happened in the clip above is justified against anyone who is filming on the street. Whoever they are.
You hypocrite, I quote”
Thursday 2 April 2009
More4 News presenter attacked live on air following G2 protests
After being asked to stop and pulled firmly out of frame the man became quite violent. He pushed the presenter with some force and then turned his aggression onto the camera, causing the live broadcast to go off air.
It’s sad that reporters can’t do their job on the streets of our cities without being subjected to this”.
Yes but God forbid the police, who are subjected to the same thing, and have to police the streets and keep it safe for you to report on, whilst outnumbered sometimes up to700%. A complete media witch hunt over the way those two cops have been treated, for using techniques that forces have been forced to adopt in light of media scrutiny over so called police brutality. Now poor cousins of the police forces we used to have fight crime with two hands behind their backs, ridiculed for failing to cut crime. Yet tabloids and broadsheets and other media denizens who lament for these days are the first to pass condemnation on these cops, forcing their suspension by politically moral nihilistic Chief officers, most likely sacking.
g7uk.com: I’m not anti-police. Nor am I one of those people who cries ‘assault’ if someone is touched in the slightest way. But, Jim, would you say that the incidents of the man being hit on the head with the shield and another being punched in the face, were justified in the particular circumstances?
I think there are good and bad on both sides.
Probably this has always happened and it’s only now that the public is seeing it, due to cameras being so widespread. In the same way that photography and film brought back images of the battlefield after they were first invented. That changed warfare and maybe this is going to change policing?