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Former NBC exec, local professor says Brian Williams ‘is a victim of his own making’

A Former NBC Executive, who is now a Professor in the QCA, reflects on the Brian Williams Scandal.

"He is a victim of his own making," said former NBC executive and local professor, as he reflected on the Brian Williams scandal.

Joe Angotti teaches Journalism at Monmouth College as a Distinguished Visiting Professor and Director of Student Publications. Before that though, he spent more than two decades in news.

"When I left NBC, I was a Senior Vice President of the News Division," he recalled. "Before that, I was Executive Producer of Special Broadcasts. Before that, I was Executive Producer of the NBC Nightly News. Before that, I worked in London. I was the NBC Bureau Chief for the London Bureau. Before that, I worked at WMAQ in Chicago. Before that, I worked at WHAS in Louisville."

During his time in New York City, Angotti met a young journalist named Brian Williams.

"I can remember seeing him on the telephone talking to correspondents in the field and going over copy with them, very politely making changes and edits," he said.

Angotti says Williams took the job of Managing Editor very seriously, but there was another side to the NBC Nightly News Anchor.

"He really enjoyed covering celebrities and Hollywood stars and rock stars, especially rock stars," he said. "He enjoyed that and that eventually kind of turned toward him being more interested in celebrity than he was in news."

"That's really unfortunate because he's a good journalist, he really is," he added.

Angotti says in recent years, he's gone back to New York City to visit friends and old colleagues. That's when he noticed a change in Williams.

"I've had lunch with him and watched him in the newsroom and I could see this kind of change, coming of stardom...," he said.

"As one Producer at NBC told me, he was becoming so boastful and he always seemed to have an entourage that followed him around wherever he went, so it was something that people were noticing and from everything I've heard, there were people who were going to the management saying there's a problem here and you better do something about it, but nothing was ever done," Angotti said.

That is, until last week when Williams apologized for a misleading story about an Iraq War Mission in 2003. On Tuesday, February 10th, 2015, Williams was suspended without pay for the next six months.

"That was wrong and completely inappropriate for someone in Brian's position," wrote NBC News President Deborah Turness.

Angotti says he thinks Williams' punishment is fair, but is still confused about some things:

"What I can't understand is the NBC brass who didn't pay attention to a lot of warnings that were coming from news staff about Brian Williams' excessiveness in terms of appearing on too many talk shows, entertainment shows, boasting about what he had done..." said Angotti. "They knew about that. There were a lot of people on the news staff - Producers and other Correspondents - who warned them that things were getting out of hand, but they chose to ignore them."

"I know that Brokaw was really concerned about what was happening and expressed that opinion to a number of people," he added. "I don't know whether they listened to him or not, but he was concerned way back."

Angotti says Williams was "the victim of his own making," but also the making of the print press.

"They took off on him in a way that I thought was a little excessive," he said. "There has been a long list of examples of journalism malpractice over the years. There was Janet Cooke from The Washington Post, who fabricated a whole series of articles that she won a Pulitzer Prize for. It was later realized that the person she wrote about didn't exist. Jayson Blair at The New York Times fabricated all kinds of stories."

"I've been disappointed that a lot of the print press has been labeling this as 'an example of television journalism that has gone astray' and another example of shallow and irresponsible reporting on television news and it's not true," Angotti said.

Angotti says Williams can serve as an example to the students he teaches... what to do and what not to do.

"It's important for Reporters, Producers - everyone involved in news - to know what proper Journalism ethics are," he said. "There have been too many cases where news organizations violate Journalism ethics and I think this case with Brian Williams is a perfect example."

"There are great temptations in this business, because there is this blurred line between entertainment and news," Angotti noted. "The danger is that too many people are beginning to step over that line or blur that line."

Angotti said the first priority should be journalism.

"Reporting should always come first," Angotti said. "Celebrity should be something that stays in the background and you have to be careful not to let that surface."

"Remember that you have a job to do as a Journalist and your job is seeking the truth," he said.

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