Fired FOX4 Reporter Rebecca Aguilar Fights Back

Fired KDFW-TV FOX4 reporter Rebecca Aguilar filed a discrimination complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Wednesday, charging the real reason behind her dismissal was because she challenged newsroom management.

Aguilar was suspended on Oct. 16, just 12 days after receiving NAHJ’s 2007 Broadcast Journalist of the Year Award. Her suspension came the day after airing a story that drew the ire of many viewers, some of whom identified themselves as gun owners and who sympathized with the man she interviewed who shot and killed two alleged burglars.

“I have a documented history of complaining about the treatment of Hispanics and Latinos by Fox4,’’ Aguilar says in the complaint dated April 23rd. “In September of 2007, I proposed to Ms. Barrs (Fox4’s Vice President of News) that the station at least apply the Rooney Rule (requiring management to seek out qualified minorities) when it came to interviewing Latino and Hispanic candidates for management positions.”

The complaint continues: “…the next month the station, specifically Barrs, trumped up an incident that resulted in my termination.”

Aguilar’s attorney Steve Kardell said he is confident that the six-month EEOC investigation will confirm his findings that she did nothing wrong and was treated unfairly.

“To accuse her of being too aggressive, that’s what FOX reporters get paid for,” Kardell said. “She did a great job for 14 years and all of a sudden on somebody’s whim she’s out.”

When asked for a comment, the station released this statement: “FOX4 looks forward to defending our decision in the appropriate forum.”

Aguilar said that the support she received from colleagues, viewers, community members and others helped her get through this dark period and motivate her to fight for her professional life.

“Thank God for the support of other journalists. They realized that this can happen to them,” Aguilar said. “I still love being a reporter. You can lose a job, but you don’t lose your desire to be a journalist. I hope I can repair the damage that’s been done to my name and my reputation.”

During the 14 years she was at FOX4 in Dallas, Aguilar said didn’t hold her tongue.

“I specifically wanted diversity pertaining to management and I was always the squeaky wheel, so they wanted to shut up the squeaky wheel,” Aguilar added. “If I’m allowed to improve things on the outside with my reporting, why am I not allowed to seek to improve the newsroom?”

Aguilar, who accepted NAHJ’s Broadcast Journalist of the Year Award at the association’s Noche de Triunfos Awards Gala in October 4, is a multiple Emmy Award Winner. Also a 2003 winner of the News Corp. (Fox) Global Employee of the Year, she impressed the NAHJ judges because of her solid journalism, dogged investigations and advocacy particularly on the issues of foster care, child abuse and domestic abuse.

On Oct. 16, the station suspended Aguilar after complaints from the blogosphere that she conducted an “ambush” interview with 70-year-old James Walton who had fatally shot two burglars coming onto his junkyard business.

The station received many phone calls and emails with complaints about the story, particularly from some people who identified themselves as gun owners and others who defended Walton’s right to protect his property. They accused her of being against guns and charged she was abusive toward the elderly man.

Although there were differing opinions among journalists about the style, not the substance, of her questioning, most of the analysis of the piece by journalism experts concluded that the story was fair, that she did nothing unethical, and that she treated Walton appropriately given the situation. Aguilar rebutted the charge that she “ambushed” him by stating that Walton himself told her where he was going to be – at a gun shop buying a rifle to replace the one police had confiscated from him.

She received death threats as a result of the story. Initially, Aguilar said, station management just referred her to local police to handle the situation on her own.

Four days after her suspension, NAHJ called for Aguilar’s immediate reinstatement “for the sake of good journalism” and criticized the station’s handling of this matter.

“It signals that journalists stand alone and without defense by the news media companies they work for when their lives are threatened for doing a job so essential to our society and democracy,” said NAHJ President Rafael Olmeda in a letter to Kathy Saunders, KDFW’s vice president/general manager.

Saunders wrote back, saying: “while it is not our standard operating practice to discuss confidential matters regarding our employees, our corporate security professionals have reached out to Ms. Aguilar regarding the threats she received.”

Both NAHJ and UNITY: Journalists of Color expressed concern that Aguilar was the only person disciplined. If the piece were so objectionable, the associations contend, others should have been reprimanded. Some weeks later, three other employees, including the editor who approved the piece, were suspended for a few days.