Schmuck Alert: Twin Cities Smackdown

This one's tricky. Did a news crew trespass on school property? Did a school official have to get all grabby? Do these pants make me look fat? These questions now linger over the Twin Cities region after an incredibly avoidable affray went down in front of God, Allah and everybody ... Crews from both KARE and KSTP traveled to the campus of Tarik ibn Zayad Academy, a charter school accused of offering religious instruction in Islam to its students. From there things get murky. While the KARE crew - who say they called ahead to gain permission to be there - was left alone, school director
Asad Zaman took issue with the KSTP crew and without so much as a "Get off my lawn!", tried to wrench the camera from the photographer's grip. What followed was a staggered fracas in which everyone involved came off looking like an ass. People, what have we learned? Hmm? Bueller? Anybody?

Okay, let's review: First: When members of the media decide to go on public school grounds, they'd do well to ask permission first. Sure, there's probably some law somewhere stating otherwise, but as a parent myself I can't feel too sorry for anyone bum-rushing a schoolyard. Feel free to shoot video from across the street, but if you wanna hang with the kiddies, consult the authorities first. If you're lucky they'll give you one of those sticky visitor badges. I got about a million. Second: If you're a school official, a rent-a-cop or just some hyperventilating bystander, here's a tip: Hands off the camera! Whether or not you have the right to remove said news crew, there a million better ways than grabbing the lens. It's akin to going for a cop's service pistol. Disagree? You don't know the photogs I do. I got buddies I'd raher punch in the teeth than pick up their rig - let alone drag it off their shoulder down by the school buses.

So, while the news crew fumes and the school officials vacillate, I'm washing my hands of this whole silly business by decreeing a first ever all encompassing Schmuck Alert for the entire Twin Cities region. Ya'll act like you got some sense. Schmucks!

Schmuck Alert: Plenty to Go Around

Ya know, he had me ‘til the end. Jeffrey Weinsier had every right to stand on the sidewalk outside Miami Central Senior High School yesterday. There to cover a story on local school violence, he handled himself with reasonable aplomb when police arrived to kick him off a public sidewalk. That kind of thing doesn’t set well with the American press . See, we operate under the assumption the Constitution is still in full effect. When certain officers try to amend those rights by pushing us off public property while Sally Joe Housecoat roams freely, we feel obligated to object. That’s seemingly what happened when, after retreating across the street, Weinsier joked to his photog about getting arrested and walked back toward the school. The next thirty seconds or so are fairly predictable: officer insists reporter leaves, reporter refuses, oversized bracelets come into play. When word of the arrest came across my desk, I almost rubber stamped it with a regulation Schmuck Alert. Then I read about the .38.

A loaded .38, tucked into Weinsier’s waistband. Police found it when they searched the reporter - whereupon he rightly informed them he had a concealed weapon permit that allowed him to hide a gun on his person. Seems death threats from a restaurant investigation had convinced Weinsier to arm himself and he just happened to be packing heat when the law accosted him outside the school. Y-e-a-h-h…Look. I’ve no real beef with concealed weapons. It ain’t my tactic of choice, but members of my family embrace the practice. (Hopefully they’ll be visiting the day Bin Laden pops out of his spider hole.) Station attorneys are quick to point out ‘that a concealed weapons permit allows a firearm within a thousand feet of a school, but not inside a school and that Weinsier never went into the school.’ But why didn’t Weinsier stash his gat in his whip before loitering outside the school, or at least rethink his insistence on being arrested, knowing he was armed. Perhaps I’m just a parent with an aversion to weaponry - or maybe I’ve known too many reporters to trust any of them around my kids’ schools with a handgun…

Either way, I’m issuing a Schmuck Alert for the five county region. Blame the officers involved all-right, but don’t forget to include Jeffery Weisner - who probably just lost his invitation to come speak at graduation. Schmucks!

Schmuck Alert: Just Spray It!

Just when the Schmuck Alert was growing passé, some tool in Connecticut breaks out the bug spray. Meet Sean P. Quail, loving husband, t-shirt enthusiast, irrational dill-weed. How else do you describe a guy who grabs a can of insecticide out of his handy-dandy dashboard insecticide-holder and aims straight for the Fourth Estate? Oh, I know - SCHMUCK! NOt to mention Defendant, as this sensible gent now faces reckless endangerment, third-degree assault, and a few other charges. It all started when Quail and his beloved exited an Enfield Courthouse after she faced charges of receiving stolen beer. A waiting scrum gave chase; what happened next would be hard to believe, were it not captured on videotape.

(But that's the funny thing about camera crews: they tend to record stuff. Bear that in mind the next time you reach for the RAID, America.)

Reporter George Colli and photographer Alan Chaniewski caught the worst of the wasp and hornet spray. While they rushed next door for first aid, police pursued the would-be Exterminator, arresting him a short time later. It's unclear whether Quail will be rewarded with his own reality show, but we here at the Lenslinger Institute wouldn't be all that surprised. We're just glad members of the media escaped serious injury, for no matter how annoying that logo'd lens might be. no one deserves a face full of distilled bug-death, except maybe Sean P. Quail - who remains a danger to his community and a most repugnant schmuck.


Schmuck!

Schmuck Alert: OH N-O-O-O!!!

Schmuck Alerts were once reserved for crimes against the video community, but as technology grows so too must the wisdom and vigilance of the Lenslinger Institute. Thus, I submit the first ever Schmuck Alert issued solely for still photographer abuse...

Woody Marshall was doing what you might expect a newspaper photographer to do at the scene of a press conference: taking pictures. That was until a lumbering oaf took issue with his technique and tried to wrestle the camera from his hands. Or maybe 28 year old Malik Brown had another reason for rolling through the lobby of Macon, Georgia's City Hall like some evil Mr. Kool-Aid bent on ripple and vengeance. OH Y-E-A-H? Oh shit. The evidence is on the tape. It begins with Malik Brown pinning the smaller Mr. Marshall against a wall, then attempting some kind of do-si-do maneuver before exiting the building with all the grace of a buffalo in his death throes. Once outside, Mr. brown grapples with another snapper, pushing and pulling the man while imploring him to relax. "Better calm down, better calm down..." the concerned citizen is heard advising. Hey, I got an idea. Keep your beefy meat-hooks off me and my pulse will slow. Until then, I'm gonna do everything to distract you until some bailiff decides to man up and hit you with his Taser. Or tranquilizer dart. Schmuck!

Schmuck Alert: Attack of the Hardhat!

If the list of reporters honored by The Lenslinger Institute was any shorter, we might get around to writing it down. At the moment though, only one name echoes down these hallowed halls: Stormin' Bob Norman. He's the Miami reporter who didn't let a dude in a plastic hat get away with manhandling his partner Mario Alonso. The back-story is a bit dense; something about garbage company contracts. But what's important here is that the journalists were well within their rights when they set up on a public street to shoot video of a recycling plant in Pompano Beach. Enter one furious foreman. "You can't take pictures of the plant!" he barked as Mario trained the camera on him instead. That's when the foreman got all grabby with the glass, prompting reporter Bob Norman to give the smaller man a friendly SHOVE! A tussle ensued, until the apoplectic hardhat scooped up the crew's wireless microphone and stormed off with it, (presumably to launch his own TV network centered around short, angry men in safety gear). This doesn't sit well with our new buddy Bob, who demanded the microphone be returned, then waited calmly while the foreman called 9-1-1.

"Hello, Police? I just attacked an innocent news crew and stole their microphone. Can you come out here and remind me what a bitch move that was?"

Okay so the foreman probably worded it differently but it doesn't really matter because once authorities did arrive, they listened to both sides, watched the video and suggested Mr. Ass-hat return what was never his to begin with. In the end, the foreman even shook hands with the WPLG crew and at last check all seemed rosy in the Sunshine State. Normally, this is where we step in and issue an official Schmuck Alert for crimes against the camera. That we're happy to do (Schmuck!), but it's what Bob Norman did during and after the episode that has this esteemed panel awkwardly trying to high-five itself. Norman didn't have to push the man away, but he did. The investigative reporter explained why in a wry slide show that appeared on his station's website shortly after the incident.


"Mario is completely vulnerable at this moment and the camera itself, which is ridiculously expensive, is also in jeopardy."


"In defense of man and property, I push him back. As you can see his hand is still on the camera."


"I'm thinking, he's short, but he's pretty strong ... and it looks like we're going to go at it. Space is my friend with this little bull."


Norman's station could have saturated the airwaves with looped footage of the whole goofy affair, but for a while they held their fire. The slide show and its more than apt captions drew a few eyeballs without mangling the mission at hand. Norman's eventual piece wisely centered on all that he uncovered and treated the attack of the hardhat as the mere curiosity it was. Well played, Bob Norman. Well played. As for that other guy...

SCHMUCK!

Schmuck Alert: Andy Dick

Oh Andy, where did we go wrong? I used to like you, thinking you hilarious in a skeevy, D-List kind of way. Now however, it seems you’ve gone insane, hefting wretched expletives, trading spit in seedy nightclubs and running your career into the sewer. Most recently you committed that most cardinal sin: you attacked a photog for no real good reason. I can’t get behind that - even if the cameraman in question was just some trollop-stalker from TMZ. So, despite the pain it brings your Mother and me, I’m issuing a Class 3 Schmuck Alert for the entire California coast. Get thee to rehab Mr. Dick, pull your life out of the airport bathroom stall that is West Hollywood and find a way to be funny again - without being a schmuck. Schmuck.

Schmuck Alert: Johnny Marshmallow

Via Photog's Lounge, word of a Midwest offensive that left a cameraman stunned and bloodied. It happened back in October, when an Oklahoma woman was attacked and killed by a pack of dogs. This of course drew a throng of onlookers to the grisly scene and when the inevitable TV fleet rolled up, friends and family members of the deceased took immediate umbrage. A verbal dispute ensued; family members insisted the news crews leave and were no doubt rebuffed. That's when Johnnie "Marshmallow" Levi Byrd broke out the haymakers, bloodying the nose of photojournalist Bryon Ackerman - before disappearing into the Oklahoma ether. Weeks later, an investigation led to a photo lineup and Ackerman easily fingered the 21 year old punk-ass as the owner of the sucker-punches. Upon questioning, Johnnie Levi Byrd folded like a two-dollar tent, admitting to the fisticuffs. He's now charged with assault and battery...

Responding to fresh tragedy is never easy. Most news crews - not all - know how to do so without needlessly riling up the natives. On the other hand, losing a loved one is horrific enough without a loitering posse of interlopers outside. I can only hope the aforementioned crews employed some modicum of respect, because I'm issuing a low level Schmuck Alert for Johnny Marshmallow here, with the following terse addendum: Sorry about your loved one. You can honor her memory by telling the media what a fine person she was, or simply flip us all off. But assaulting a member of that unfortunate scrum is downright felonious and will do nothing to bring her back. As for the ninja star necklace, we'll let that slide for now - but wailing away on a photog who doesn't want to be there in the first place is just incredibly uncool. Schmuck...

Schmuck Alert: Sight of the Gun

TV News: the only profession where you place yourself in volatile situations, then wheeze like a banshee when trouble erupts. That said, there is ABSOLUTELY no excuse for pulling a gun you don't plan to use, let alone menacing a news crew with it. But there's no denying that's exactly what happened in Joiner, Arkansas the other day, thanks to the magic of video...

"Excuse me, Cameraman? Yes, you - the one I'm threatening with bodily harm and a firearm... you're not recording this, are you? 'Cause if you're, I'd be be pretty thick to keep whipping out my piece like this. Maybe I'll just hold it by my side and walk away like I have to pee. You keep rolling while your lady friend goes all Isiah Carey up in this joint..."

Okay, so it's easy to poke fun, but if someone pulled a heater on ME, whatever audio that followed would be so draped in profanity, Ozzy Osbourne's kids would file a complaint with the FCC. Truth is, reporter April Thompson and photographer Ben Short did a lot of things correctly when an angry young man pulled up and broke out his best Boomhauer. Thompson remained chill and got out of the camera's way, Short kept rolling and centered his lens on their surprise guest. It was all rather textbook until Dude smacks the camera, then runs back to his pick-up for more than a little ordnance. At that point, mere hindrance turned criminal.

Critics can fault WREG for pimping the incident out of proportion and they may have a point, but the fact remains that jack-ass brandished a weapon in front of an innocent news crew and no matter the showboating that followed, that shit ain't cool. So ease up on the Monday morning quarterbacking, fellow media members! I've seen a few of you soil your action slacks whenever a bug flies into the car. Who knows what dialect you may affect once somebody pulls a hand-cannon on you! Me - I'd reach for a word understandable in any language...


SCHMUCK!  


(By the way, the subtitle of this particular Schmuck Alert is a lame attempt to salute David Carr's The Night of the Gun, quite possibly the finest junkie memoir you'd ever want to read. A Lenslinger Library Favorite!) 

Schmuck Alert: Get a Leg Up!

Okay, show of hands... Who here hasn't fantasized about ripping off a tripod leg and going all Billy Jack on somebody? I myself have concocted whole action sequences in my head while pacing about some deserted sallyport (look it up). But to actually do it? In broad daylight? As cameras rolled? Gentility forbids! Besides, you know what kind of tensile strength it takes to wrench a limb off a modern-day camera stand? I'm w-a-a-y too lazy for that. Plus, I got CLASS - a mental condition not shared by the crazy bitch, er, distraught family member who - in under sixty seconds - brought more shame to Detroit City than any twenty members of the Kiss Army combined. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to step away from this paragraph and collect my thoughts.

Ahem.

You know, we've seen a lot of savagery here at Schmuck Alert Central. Handcuff tantrums, slow-motion moonshiner spit, a veritable parade of ill-advised dropkicks... But in all our days of screening rash of acts of video, we've never before witnessed the kind of tripod atrocity as the wanton utensil sacrifice depicted in the clip below.  As with many crimes against the camera, it happened outside a courthouse. That's where the families of both the victim and defendant in a murder case left an arraignment Saturday afternoon. Free from the supervision of the courtroom's drowsy bailiffs, the relatives waste no time cursing each other and the predictable collision ensues.

Third verse, same as the first.

Or so we think, for after a few moments of rampant apoplexy, one young lady sheds her pink jacket and does something wholly unexpected. She makes a beeline for the nearest tripod, body-slams the damn thing, then throttles that weak-kneed beast in front of God and everybody. This is a new maneuver in the annals of news crew abuse and quite possibly, a sign of the apocalypse. I can only wonder what's going through the photog's mind as he pans from the general chaos around him to the methodical dismemberment of the three-legged creature he takes with him everywhere he goes. The mind reels. Worse yet, the woman manages to separate said leg, no easy feat I assure you. She then brandishes it a bit before finally following her family down the street, all the while twirling the broken leg like some demented drum majorette from Hell and leaving the rest of civilization speechless...

Schmuck!

Schmuck Alert: THE BLOG!

Ever since orb-hurling hothead Kenny "Not the Gambler" Rogers openly assailed a cameraman for reasons known only to himself, I've felt compelled to issue Schmuck Alerts. What can I say? Some folks were put on this Earth to cure Polio, refine space flight, or stop global warming. Me - I'm here to lambast those who manhandle fancycams. I'm cool with that. What I'm NOT cool with is my civic duty interfering with the meandering introspection and half-baked analysis highlighted here at Viewfinder BLUES. So, after a long weekend of being locked away in the Lenslinger Labs with the trusty Weave, I appear before you addled, odiferous and a more dedicated than ever to kicking my pixel-addiction. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you:

schmuckalert.com

Give it a click, won't you? There you'll find everything you ever wanted to know about those folks stupid enough to wrestle with a functional recording device. Cops! Criminals! City Leaders! Celebrities! Some guy with gravy on his shirt! NOBODY IS SAFE from the open disdain and trademark snark doled out at this, the latest subsidiary of Lenslinger Industries. Come for the mockery! Stay for the overblown prose! No -- wait! Don't Go! it ain't just me runnin' my mouth. Oh No! We got a cast of thousands! (Okay, Weaver said he would help...)

The Schmuck Alert Justice League aims to be you one-stop source for unwarranted fisticuffs with the Fourth Estate. Videos! Polls! Guest contributors and maybe even a Poetry Slam or two! When it comes to spotlighting the plight of camera crews and the buffoons who abuse them, schmuckalert.com is well worth the visit. Be one of the first hundred visitors and win a Viewfinder BLUES virtual t-shirt! Think how impressed your Facebook friends will be when you tell them you're wearing that over your regular pajama top!

Seriously, if schmuckalert.com stops just ONE portly rent-a-cop, ONE shackled crackhead, ONE star-crossed trollop from laying hands on their friendly neighborhood lenslinger, then the three showers I skipped over the past few days will be more than worth it. Just ask my wife! Or better yet - leave us alone altogether! There's plenty to keep you busy over there, so dive right and get your fill of silly linkage, sophomoric humor and more scary drifters than you can shake a restraining oder at. When you're back in the mood for more adult fare, I'll be RIGHT HERE ... playing with my action-figure.

Schmuck Alert: Bachmann's Mob

I have an aching distaste for politicians. They remind me of small market news anchors with coke problems: paranoid, grandiose, willing to gab all night with total strangers - as long as another blast of adulation was coming back their way. Perhaps I'm projecting. On second thought, no. I've stood through enough city council meetings, governor's huddles and Presidential pit stops to know the only thing more maniacal than your average incumbent is the person currently working so furiously to unseat them.Which brings me to Michelle Bachmann, aka the poor man's Sarah Palin. Lately she's been making all the right noises as she crisscrosses the country in an effort to make Barack Obama a community organizer again. That's cool! Depending on your views, she's either the GOP's latest great white hope or a headstrong wretch whose husband wants to pray Barney Frank back to lumberjack status. None of which concerns me.

What does concern me, however, is the way Michele Bachmann handles her business. In the eight weeks that she's been a Presidential candidate, her sycophants have manhandled members of the press; shoving, pushing and threatening reporters as they attempted to make her a viable choice for leader of the free world by hanging on her every heavily scripted soundbite. It's happened five times. Five times! It's flippin' systemic! Much of the roughhousing has happened in the scrum, when membes of the Fourth Estate close in on a candidate and pepper them with questions. It's an American tradition that dates back to the American Revolution  -  though I can't ever remember George Washington getting his knickers in a twist whenever some scribe wanted to fixate on his wooden teeth. Even Sarah Palin herself manages to plow though a far angrier press mob without drawing blood (and looking like a million bucks, might I add).

Don't get me wrong. Certain reporter types CAN be assholes (Don't make me draw up a list). But if you're aching to lead the planet's last superpower into the Twenty-teens, you're simply going to have to deal with it. And telling your goons to let loose with the elbows and retorts is only going to make you look bad - especially in an age where a candidate's every wet fart is tweeted, Facebooked and blogged before those late night comedians even come into the office.  That's why we've taken unprecedented steps here at the Lenslinger Institute. We're issuing our first ever STANDING Schmuck Alert on Michelle Bachmann, not because we think she has a prayer of gaining office, but because of the fatwa she has apparently declared on the working media. That Mickey Mouse shit won't get you to the White House, lady, but it WILL get you top billing every night on TMZ. Here's hoping you enjoy the view.

Schmuck! 

Schmuck Alerts: A Troubling Trend

Ever since that goon Kenny Rogers (not The Gambler) went inexplicably mental on a cameraman, I've taken great delight in issuing Schmuck Alerts. The criteria was simple: Accost a photog and I'll drench the incident in pixels, spotlight your unwise actions and proclaim you a schmuck. Call it 'Cameraman's Revenge'. But like many guilty pleasures. my little tocsins were not without their complications. Sure there were plenty of candidates. School Officials, Rookie Cops, Business Owners, Hillbilly Women, C-List Celebrities - even a Colorado State Representative lost their minds long enough to earn a spot in my cyber hall of shame. But along the way, I began to question my judgement - for not every collision of lens and extremity deserves my polysyllabic wrath. At the same time, the sheer number of these unfortunate episodes skyrocketed; a trend that has as much to do with YouTube usage as it does newly recorded rancor. Thus, I'm recalibrating my Schmuck detector by examining three recent cases of news crew stupidity that don't quite warrant this particular pejorative - even if it seems like they should....

To call Derek Matthews a schmuck is to sully the verve of this wonderful word. Dude's a menace. What else do you call someone accused of opening fire on camera crews and firefighters alike? That's what happened in Indianapolis this week as WISH-TV photographer Kevin Hankins felt something hot crawl up his back while he framed up the flames of a vacant home. It wasn't a glowing ember, but rather the projected pellets of a small caliber weapon. In the parlance of polite society, 'That ain't cool'. Hankins escaped serious injury but a fireman and a freelance photog were also hit. Police soon arrested the 30 year old Matthews (and his gun) for the unprovoked attack. When asked why he shot at the unsuspecting scrum, the registered sex offender mumbled something about no cameras showing up when he got shot last month. Hope he's enjoying the attention now.

Dateline: Oklahoma City. It was a quiet Saturday morning at the KOCO studios when a news producer was shaken from his stupor by a voice on the loading dock phone claiming to have an injured woman outside. Oooo-kay! Most show stackers are used to having news stories brought to them on a silver platter, but this is ridiculous! TV stations are sparsely staffed on weekend mornings; executive decisions are often made my folks wearing flip-flops - but only if they paid for the pizza. This time however, a stranger and a woman with a possible bullet in her gut wanted the ten cent tour. Instead, staffers called an ambulance and then, The Law. Paramedics took the woman to the E.R., cops drove the man to the pokey. So who's the schmuck? The guy, I guess - not only for possibly shooting his partner, but for thinking his local affiliate was a suitable place to dispose of the future body. Personally, I blame all those insipid CSI shows...

And finally, a case with real potential: A news crew with uncomfortable questions. A business owner in a revved-up wheelchair. Can’t you just smell the Schmuck Alert? I could - until I saw the tape and realized that - tragically -this was schmuckery denied. Don‘t get me wrong; Raymond Hyatt had no right no drop his seated scooter into gear and make for the ankles of photog Al (Lucky or Tough) Miller. But the beleaguered bar owner had asked the news people to stop recording, offering to answer their questions if they'd just turned the camera off. The crew refused and, feeling cornered, Hyatt unwisely accelerated. That's when Action News Reporter Russ Ptacek came into play, launching into the kind of Wronged Reporter Karoake that always makes me lunge for the remote. What followed of course was Missouri’s most unneeded exclusive - a breathless telecast about a dangerous mid-shin collision, replete with bad acting and traded congratulations. As Shatner and Rollins say,'I can't get behind that'.

Hmm? Oh yeah...Schmucks!

Schmuck Alert: LAPD

As a law and order man, I try to give all constables a pass. Theres is a job of inconvenience and angst, of which I can well identify. And if there ever were an agency beleaguered by the media, be it Britney and the stalkerazzi or the news choppers hovering over slow-speed madmen, it is the LAPD. But ever since a citizen's lens etched the Rodney King beatdown in the national consciousness, L.A.'s finest have had waged a fatwa on the fancycam. The latest outrage comes to us courtesy of beFrank, West Coast bureau chief of the Photog Nation. Apparently a cluster of cameras was forming around the scene of drive-by shooting in Glassell Park yesterday when an officer ran afoul of KCAL's Jeff Mailes, pictured here being unceremoniously stuffed into a squad car. The offense: Uncertain. But the violation clearly centers around some real estate near the shooting, a a patch of ground open to the public - but closed to the media.

Why some officers insist on keeping camera crews out of breaking news scenes is a mystery. You can cite property rights and public safety all you want, but that guy with the badge trying to push you back to the county line is the same one who got the COPS box set last Christmas and if you just be nice, you'll both avoid in run-ins with the management. Having said that are some tenants that should be observed by all, like the delineation of crime scenes and public property. One would think it would be as evident as billowing yellow tape, but the roadside negotiations between cops and camera-ops rivals that of the drama being cranked out in all those faceless LA. warehouses. Therefore, I'm forced at pixelpoint to issue another Schmuck Alert for the L.A. freakin' P.D. What up, fellas? The DVR dump your favorite episode of Reno 911? Schmucks...

Schmuck Alert: Charlotte's Finest

NOTE: Apocalyptic weather notwithstanding, Team 'Slinger remains committed to exposing gross acts of grab-ass involving TV news cameras - if for no other reason to bring shame to that overpaid choad Kenny Rogers...

Dateline: Charlotte. A couple of TV News photogs from competing stations respond to the scene of a fatal accident, eventually finding a perch on a nearby embankment. Very soon two officers with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department began ordering WBTV photographer Travis Washington to stop shooting. Washington, a credentialed news-gatherer on public property dared to question "WHY?" - a brazen move that brought about the full fury of one particular female officer. Demanding he stop recording, Officer Midol tried to wrestle the camera from Washington's hand, thus causing the delicate tool to drop unceremoniously to the ground. "You're not showing proper respect to people in the accident", admonished the constable before cuffing and stuffing the paid station employee in the back of her police cruiser. There Washington sat for about an hour, before being released without charges. He then sought treatment for a minor back injury related to the confrontation. The camera itself sustained about $1,000 in damage and WBTV plans to ask police to pay for those repairs.

To which we here at the Lenslinger Institute ask "WHAT THE F*DGE?" Police officers ARE in charge of emergency scenes; it's quite common (if not particularly legal) for them to corral photographers behind imaginary lines only they can see. In the Queen City however, law enforcers are also cinematographers, civil rights attorneys, judges and juries. When they attained this lofty status is still unclear, but we assume it happened to them shortly before city officials deemed them Omnipotent Overlords of the Fourth Estate. That looks damn spiffy on a business card, but it ain't worth the taxpayer provided paper it's printed on. And why did Channel 3's cameraman get manhandled while Channel 9's lenser was left alone enough to videotape the whole damn thing? And what's with this trend of shoving a pesky photog in the back of a cop car, only to release him (or her) 120 minutes later with no charges. If I pulled shit like that, I rightly be called a kidnapper, yet some Testicle with a basic law enforcement course under his (or her) gunbelt is free to rewrite the constitution on the spot. WTF?

Washington is on vacation this week. His station, Channel 3, is weighing their lack of options while the Charlotte -Mecklenburg Police Department launches an internal investigation. Channel 9 - which apparently has video of the whole enchilada - is sitting on their tape for the time being. I respect that, I guess; they could make great ratings hay of running that puppy on a loop throughout their every newscast. Still, a little sunshine's powerful disinfectant and releasing said outrage sure would make it easier on armchair pundits like the ones at Schmuck Alert Central. Speaking of which, we're surprisingly law and order around here. I know LOTS of cops and even more news photogs. With a few glaring exceptions, their all folks I'd have over for a bar-b-cue. At breaking news scenes, the attending press is about as thrilled to be there as the cops - who would no doubt prefer parking in clusters just off the interstate. That's cool - I just wish the men and women in blue would educate their junior colleagues a abit better, for far too often it's the rookie cop that loses his effin' mind when lenses gather on the edge of calamity. Seems they should cover the basic rights of the press at the Academy. Hell, I'd be willing to go hold a seminar, provided they' wouldn't go all Abu Ghraib on my tired ass.

Schmucks.

Schmuck Alert: INCOMING!

File this under ways I won't die: set ablaze with bottle rockets by some shirtless yuck in the middle of the night. Sure, some reprobate might wing me with an attempted forehead scorcher, but his next target will be the logo on the back of my news unit, for dodging bottle rockets falls just beyond my job description. Guess I'd make a lousy war correspondent. Veteran Dallas TV News photographer Robert Flagg, however, may have The Right Stuff. That's him sticking around far longer than I would have the other night as some upstanding taxpayers celebrated our nation's freedom by aiming their rockets not at the heavens, but at each other. (Officer Darwin, paging Officer Darwin...) When photog Flagg rolled up with fancycam in tow, the fine citizens of the Creekside Villa apartment complex took direct aim at The Fourth Estate."The missiles — or whatever they were — they were hitting, they were bouncing off my chest and off my camera," Flagg said. "One hit me in the back, and it burned my neck and it burned my shirt." When the PO-leece arrived, they too became targets, a development we here at the Lenslinger Institute find downright disturbing, for our great nation is indeed in peril when Independence Day in Texas begins to resemble the trailer for RoboCop. While strapping plate metal to some hack-cocked officer would make for interesting video, we simply can't afford it. Thus, we're locking our doors tight, turning down the scanners and issuing a blanket Schmuck Alert for any yahoo stupid enough to launch incendiaries at a cop, a camera, hell, even a consultant.

Schmucks!

Schmuck Alert: Like a Rock

A camera was grabbed, so this technically qualifies as a SCHMUCK ALERT, but I can't feel but so good about the lens-centered fisticuffs captured recently. A news crew had just arrived outside a Chevrolet dealership in Wayland, Michigan when they caught sight of some freshly fired employees knocking each other to the ground. It may be an unfortunate sign of the times, but whenever anybody is body-slammed on camera, an assignment editor get their wings. Thus, the intrepid news crew dug in on the perimeter and no doubt wondered if they'd be the next citizens tasting the sidewalk. They weren't, but the bruiser in the pink hat did come out and berate them while his buddy stuck his hands in the lens. People, people! How many times have we discussed this? In America members of the media CAN set up on public property and point their cameras just about anywhere. It may be a bit unsavory at times, but that whole 'freedom the press' thing really comes in handy when demonstrating democracy. No doubt there will be other businesses going under in this apocalyptic economy and sure as shootin' a news crew will scurry on over to get it all on tape. Wanna stay off the tee-vee when that happens? Don't shove your coworker into a trashcan in front of God or a photog! We tend to record those things and share them with the tri-county region. Now how's THAT going to look on your resumé? Schmucks...

Schmuck Alert: LAPD,WTF?

A big dip of the lens to El-Guapo for reminding me of my civic duty. Thus, I'm issuing a Class 5 Schmuck Alert to the Los Angeles Police Department for their chaotic mishandling of an immigration rally in MacArthur Park. Apparently worried the Rodney King legacy of years past was fading from our collective memory, officers opted to go medevial on a group of protestors, bystanders and - gasp! - journalists. As I often tell my children, that's inherently uncool. What I cannot explain however, is what convinced the dudes in riot gear it would be wise to attack the crowd with batons and rubber bullets. Among the many victims were news crews from Telemundo and KCAL (home of beFrank!), soem of whom were briefly hospitalized after the inexplicable assault. Truly it's hard to know where to start with this one. Was it simply pack mentality? Mob rule? Too much caffeine? Whatever the trigger, it's awful hard to explain why an officer would knock a working photog to the ground, then smash his station-owned fancycam. Was the camera protesting? Did a retired Darryl Gates issue a fatwa on all landborne media? Do these pants make me look fat? Wait - don't answer that last one. Just repeat after me:

...Schmucks.

Schmuck Alert: Memphis Melee

You know, nothing sucks the fun out of a Schmuck Alert like video of an injured colleague. Nonetheless, we here at The Lenslinger Institute have been gravely reviewing the stretcher-side soundbites of one Mike Moore, an award winning photographer/producer working out of Memphis, Tennessee. Seems he and FOX13 reporter Lauren Johnson were working on a story about boys and teen pregnancy Wednesday night when a passing group of youth embraced barbarity. That's a fancy way of saying a bunch of young thugs attacked Moore, pelting him from eventually every angle...

"One kid would draw my attention and before I knew it, it was like kids hitting me from every side and I don't know where the hits are coming from..."

Moore sought care at Methodist Central Hospital being released. Memphis Police charged two teens with Simple Assault and Vandalism over $500. The accused duo are students at Northwest Prep Academy, an alternative school for kids with behavioral issues, where apparently these reprobates are earning their keep. Hmmm, with Emmys and years of experience under his belt, Mike Moore sounds like the kind of guy any troubled young student could learn a lot from. Instead, you attacked him for seemingly no reason. Schmucks!

Schmuck Alert: Dumb and Dumber

I guess the news crews had it coming. After all, they had the audacity to knock on the door of a Longview, Washington union hall and offer coverage of an ongoing dispute. They were roughly rebuffed. And that's when those jackals from the Fourth Estate stepped over the line. They pointed their cameras at an official note posted on the union hall door. It was more than one schmuck could bear. In a flash, a seething figure wrapped in shrunken flannel burst from the building and in one fell swoop, lowered all the boats in the harbor. "I say, good man, won't you refrain from videotaping our premises?" he did NOT say. Instead, this bellicose nutbag put on a performance that proved not all stereotypes are wrong, lashing out at the reporters and photographers with enough guttural language to make a drill instructor blush.

It seemed it wouldn't end as the longshoreman bounced from one camera to the next, grabbing lenses, threatening everyone and setting back his cause a hundred years. Really now, sir. Wouldn't your stance be better served by reasoned discourse, or even the unimaginative 'No Comment' - rather than the homoerotic comeuppance you slung all over that parking lot? Down South, we call that 'showing your ass' and we generally discourage it unless blood has been shed (or a pitcher of sweet tea has been spilled).  Rarely do we endorse the kind of infantile vulgarity that seems to be your strong suit, if only because it convinces people their prejudices are correct. Didn't you notice the photogs were having a ball? Throbbing veins and flying spittle are a challenge to shoot, but when you back it up with a vocal performance like that, it is a pleasure to bleep and disseminate. Something to think about as your and your pals crack open another Meister Brau, or whatever cut-rate beer you guys drink for breakfast.

Schmuck!

Oh, and if that wasn't enough moronic showboating for you, a clip has surfaced of an EMS official accosting a WNBC photojournalist. " I told you to stop!" the medical technician yells, mistaking his dangling walkie-talkie for the Sword of Grayskull. The photog appears as perplexed as we the audience, but that's a natural expression when an otherwise mild-mannered first responder tries to wrestle your livelihood from your grip. Hey, you don't see us media types snatching stethoscopes from the necks of unsuspecting medics, do you? Do you? Hyperbole aside, I'm most troubled by this last clip, as we news shooters have great respect for emergency medical technicians and work hard to stay out of their way. I mean, we expect longshoremen to go ape-shit when the big words start to fly, but an EMT? Must be more to that story and we here at the Lenslinger Institute are anxious to hear it. Meanwhile we can only judge the evidence before us and lump Mr. Medic in with that flannel-clad oaf with the limited vocabulary.

SCHMUCKS! 



UPDATE! Proving there is some justice in this world, the bellicose longshoreman featured above has been arrested on four felony charges: burglary in the first degree, assault in the second degree, intimidating a witness, and sabotage. 'A witness had alerted police that he recognized (Ronald) Stavas after seeing video on KGW-TV of an angry man who confronted a news crew at the Longshoremen union hall.' We here at the Lenslinger Institute sincerely hope he encounters some form of unwanted sodomy during his time in the, ahem, pokey. Schmuck.

Schmuck Alert: He Hates These Cams!

Ahhh, protestors. I have little use for them. It's not that I don't respect their right to dissent, I do. But in my twenty years behind the lens, I've seen many a protestor up close and I can safely report the mass majority of them don't know (1-2-3-4!) what the hell they're fighting for. Perhaps it's my blue collar roots, but I have a hard time listening to a college kid who's yet to earn a dime of his own money scream at me about what's wrong with the world. Hey, here's a thought: grab a shower, join society and fight injustice from the inside. You won't score as much weed in the process, but you will be surprised how much you can accomplish with reasoned discourse, instead of that old bongo you found in your uncle's storage unit. That said, there's only ONE thing I detest more than guy with a homemade sign: some asshole cop who thinks the sight of hippies in the park is a blank check to crack some heads.

And if grainy video is to be believed, that's exactly what happened in Minneapolis Saturday night as police moved in on a group of Occupy Minnesota demonstrators. Seems the young people were determined to set up their tents in Peavey Plaza and Loring Park, a plan that filled law enforcement officials with such apoplexy, they decided to go medieval on any and everyone in sight. Don't believe me? Check out the video. You'll see heavy-handed riot cops doling out ass-whoopings to anyone they could lay gloves on. Recording devices received much of their wrath, for what's more infuriating than a dude with no discernible income and a four hundred dollar phone in his hand? That's a judgement call you'll have to make on your own, unless you're one of Minneapolis' Finest. They seemed to agree beforehand that iPhones were the enemy of the state and only unnecessary roughness could guard society's loins from this Cupertino-based threat.

If that wasn't brutish enough, one coiled constable took it a step further, upending a photog's fancycam for no. effing. reason. It's sickening to watch - even if you don't have a groove in your right shoulder like I do. KSTP's Chad Nelson was busy minding everyone else's business when a uniformed officer took umbrage at the photojournalist's silent witness. Without so much as a "Stop or I'll shoot!", said officer shoved the expensive camera off Nelson's shoulder, slightly injuring him in the process. Ya know, cops - like photogs - don't make the money they should. Willfully damaging an innocent TV camera is akin to dropping an anvil on one of those flashing highway signs. It's dangerous, criminal and highly uncool. But so too is declaring martial law on people you disagree with, let alone some poor working stiff who has every right to put your badge number on screen. Which is why I sincerely hope Officer Pushy gets what's coming to him, for through his tantrum, he lowers the standing of the many honest law enforcers who keep our cities and streets safe from marauders, pestilence and the occasional musty trustafarian.

Schmuck!

UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE!

New video of the despicable act has surfaced, clearly showing what some here at The Lenslinger Institute has described as "a bitch move". We've also received word that KSTP Photog Chad Nelson will be filing a criminal complaint. Bravo! As for the cop in question, his name has yet to be released, but across the nation past associates of the man have gone on-line and recognized his sanctimonious shit-house grin as one of the many things they don't miss about him. We here on the TLI campus have only shake our heads and wonder what would turn a seemingly sworn officer into an unrepentant schmuck.

SCHMUCK!