What the editor of a local paper told me when he acknowledged the truth of my letter to the editor. The paper's owner feared the local prosecutor and judges that would be exposed.
In the early 1980s, after a series of corrupt and illegal activities in the Greene County Courthouse and other areas of Greene County with the full cooperation and participation of Greene County Prosecutor Bill Schenck and Judge Judson Shattuck, I wrote a letter about these activities to the editor of the Xenia Gazette in Xenia, Ohio, the seat of Greene County.
The editor advised me in writing that they were not going to publish the letter, so I called to find out why. His reasoning was that the allegations in the letter were strong and might not be supported. I made an appointment to review the letters contents and my documentation supporting the allegations.
In an extended interview with the editor, I resented my case and support for the publication of the letter. At the end of the discussion, the editor advised me that they often heard of actions of this nature in the Greene County Courthouse, but I was the first to bring them proof. He told me he would speak with the owner of the Xenia Gazette and get back to me.
Several days later, the editor called me to advise me that they still were not going to publish the letter. I asked "Why?" He replied that they could not afford to. His explanation was that, even though the courts repeatedly had ruled that such letters were the property of the author and the newspaper would not be liable, the parties in the letter and their allies would cause such legal expenses and problems for the Xenia Gazette that they could not afford to publish the letter.
Another time, my children and I were picketing the Greene County Courthouse wiht informatin about the corruption inside and a Dayton television station crew came up and asked us about the situation. After we described the facts to them, they stated that they could not use this material without first getting the okay of the corrupt judge exposed in the information.