Pubdate: Tue, 23 Sep 2014
Source: Herald, The (Everett, WA)
Copyright: 2014 Associated Press
Contact:  http://www.heraldnet.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/190
Page: A2

F-BOMB DROPPED ON CAREER IN NEWS

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - A television reporter quit her job on live 
TV with a big four-letter flourish after revealing she owns a medical 
marijuana business and intends to press for legalization of 
recreational pot in Alaska.

After reporting on the Alaska Cannabis Club on Sunday night's 
broadcast, KTVA's Charlo Greene identified herself as the business' owner.

"Everything you've heard is why I, the actual owner of the Alaska 
Cannabis Club, will be dedicating all my energy toward fighting for 
freedom and for fairness, which begins with legalizing marijuana here 
in Alaska," she said during the late Sunday evening newscast. "And as 
for this job, well not that I have a choice, but f-- it, I quit."

She then walked off camera.

KTVA News Director Bert Rudman apologized for Greene's "inappropriate 
language" and said she was terminated in statements Sunday. He 
apologized again Monday, this time for Greene's ethical lapses.

"She had a personal and business stake in the issue she was 
reporting, but did not disclose that interest to us," Rudman said in 
a statement.

"At KTVA we strive to live up to the highest journalistic standards 
of fairness and transparency. Sunday's breach of those standards is 
unacceptable and cannot be tolerated," he said.

Greene is the professional name used by Charlene Egbe. She told The 
Associated Press on Monday that she knew about a month ago that she 
would be leaving the way she did. No one else at the station knew 
anything about it, she said.

Alaska voters will decide in the November election whether to join 
Washington and Colorado in decriminalizing pot.

Greene doesn't believe the manner of her departure is harming her cause.

"Are we talking about it, or not, because of what I did. Period," she 
said. "It always goes back to the issue."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom