The Jason Collier ‘scandal’ epitomizes terrible state of news media, and I helped get it there
Were I still in the news business, I’d be a hot commodity right now, fantasizing about getting interviewed by cable news because I’m in the eye of perhaps the most intense media hurricane this side of the Mississippi.
It would be the most viewed story of my career to date.
And it would have nothing to do with journalism.
You see, I’m in my hometown of Stinnett, a mini municipality on the high plains of Texas that usually rings a bell for a few thousand people. But today it’s featured on the New York Post’s homepage and is being covered by Fox News. It’s so popular, the United Kingdom’s Sun and Daily Mail newspapers are investigating our now-former police chief, Jason Collier.
And here I’m sitting, just blocks away from where Collier was booked for the most monumentally corrupt crime and sex scandal to ever hit the Stinnett Police Department.
Except it’s not. Not even close. But I’ll get to that later.
Regarding Jason Collier, if I were still at the Amarillo Globe-News, I’d be frantically competing with the aforementioned news organizations — an incredible adrenaline rush for a reporter, second only to being on the scene of a shooting and hearing more gunfire. (Or is that just me?)
My mission: make sure the world came to me and my paper’s website for the latest on this global scandal, which led to Collier’s swift and satisfying arrest at the hand of the mythical Texas Rangers.
And what heinous charge led to his becoming one of the most infamous men on the planet and prompting deep dives into his life by international news organizations?
He forged a government document.
Oh, the humanity!
I say it in jest, but that phrase was first used by a radio journalist covering live the tragic Hindenburg disaster — an actual global news story and, at the moment, a metaphor for online news.
I need to stop here and be clear: I am in no way defending Collier. He allegedly broke the law and, if he did, should be punished accordingly by our justice system. His arrest by the Rangers, akin to the FBI here in Texas, was warranted because he was a government official when the alleged violations took place. (And to answer your question, no, I do not know the man.)
Let me also say that I am in no way criticizing you, dear reader. None of this absurdity is your fault.
It’s mine.
This is why I feel the need to point out how Collier’s alleged crime has nothing to do with the reason reporters at Fox or the Post or the Sun — or the many other online media organizations — are spending time digging into his life.
The charge is a small footnote in the overall story of Jason Collier’s demise.
His real crime — the one for which he’s being drawn and quartered in the media — was juggling relationships with multiple women, one of whom is his wife.
For that, the Post said Collier has been “busted” under a headline claiming he was “exposed.” If you’re reading this, you already know the details, so there’s no need to repeat them here.
But those details, when viewed as a potential news story, are just not enough to warrant this kind of coverage. There’s not much there, there.
When I entered the news business 12 years ago, here’s what the news story would’ve been for the Jason Collier story.
STINNETT, Texas — Jason Collier, the embattled former chief of police here, was arrested Thursday on a charge of tampering with a government document.
Collier’s arrest by the Texas Rangers comes after allegedly falsifying annulment papers. According to a woman claiming to be his girlfriend, Collier, 41, provided her with these false government documents to prove he was no longer married.
Court records show he’s married.
Collier was booked into the Hutchinson County Jail and his bond was set at $10,000, according to Jail Capt. Monica Sepulveda.
The Texas Rangers, who investigate government corruption, have not commented.
Collier was hired in February as Chief of Police in Stinnett, about an hour northeast of Amarillo. He previously worked for the nearby Borger Police Department.
The City of Stinnett accepted his resignation Thursday, according to a statement released on the city’s Facebook page shortly after he was arrested. On Wednesday, the city said Collier was on administrative leave after receiving reports of “possible violations of city employment policy.”
Or something like that.
Point is, that’s what belongs in a news story, in my opinion. It’s not nearly as scandalous as the Sun asking, “Who is Jason Collier?” as though the world needs to know the details of a guy who, I guarantee you, is not as bad as many of the cheating husbands in Stinnett.
That he was a government official, and apparently a man of the cloth, does mean we naturally hold him to a higher standard. I get that. It’s why everyone talked about Bill and Monica throughout the mid-nineties.
But he was President of the United States. Collier ran a police department for a “city” of less than 2,000.
Still, as I said at the top of this piece, I’d be working my ass off to get every new little nugget from anyone who knows him, feeding the beast that I — in my own small way — helped create, at least locally.
I am one of the three surviving members (as in still alive, tragically) of the original team of online editors for Amarillo.com when the newsroom switched to its digital-forward model. I helped install and run a team of reporters whose sole job was to chase web traffic. And ambulances. Oh, the ambulances. We enthusiastically gave the readers the French fries to which they’re now addicted and threw out all the fresh veggies, as did nearly every other newsgathering outfit in America.
The “dirty laundry” that has made Collier the subject of an international media takedown was first aired on Facebook, which is where it should’ve stayed. But if the Post and Sun and all the other news outlets don’t write about it, they’re not getting their piece.
And I’m no different.
That little news clip I wrote above? I published that on my own website within an hour of the news breaking. I also posted this essay wherever you’re reading it.
If I hadn't, I’d have missed out on web traffic and potential eyes on my other work, the stuff that’s harder to sell.
I’m addicted to junk food, too, having made the first mistake of dealing — getting high on my own supply
I know you think I’m blowing this out of proportion. That this story really is that juicy, and it really would’ve made international news anyway. I mean, I’m pretty much describing the National Enquirer’s business model, amirite?
But those are manufactured scandals about celebrities, which is bad enough, but celebs are already the subject of public scrutiny. And we don’t regard the Enquirer and its ilk as news. It’s gossip.
So is most of this Jason Collier nonsense. And even his crime is a short regional news story at best.
To demonstrate, I’m submitting into evidence another news story. It’s an apples-to-apples comparison, though possibly Red Delicious to Granny Smith.
Because this isn’t the first time a chief of the Stinnett Police Department has been arrested.
In 2002, when I was attending West Texas High School here in gold ol’ Stinnett America, we had a police chief named Preston Craig Clowdus. I remembered him being perp-walked out of the police station for being MIA from the military.
As with all small-town stories, I embellished that. A lot.
But he really was arrested and later indicted on 13 counts, including — wait for it — tampering with governmental records.
Also listed was official oppression, a charge that was filed after Clowdus allegedly held a woman against her will at nearby Lake Meredith.
That’s literal kidnapping. By a police officer.
Except he wasn’t even a police officer.
That record-tampering charge was for forging his peace officer certification.
Clowdus was also was charged with five counts of misapplication of fiduciary properties and eight counts of securing execution of a document by deception. Those charges, which were dropped as part of the plea arrangement that landed him in prison, stemmed from the city paying his salary — a count for each check he cashed for being a cop when he wasn’t.
But back to the kidnapping. As I recall — and I’m more reliable on this, dear reader — our police chief was known by us high schoolers for allegedly soliciting sexual favors from women in exchange for dropping a misdemeanor charge.
Lake Meredith is secluded, so townsfolk believed he brought at least one of those women (not any of the high school girls, thank goodness) there and performed a cock-or-walk, as we terrible teenage boys called it then. But even if that’s not what happened, if the Clowdus story had blown up like Jason Collier’s, any reporter asking around town could’ve easily gotten the story behind that official oppression charge.
But that was 2002, you say. There was no Internet in 2002. Were there even telephones?
Well, where do you think I got the information on Clowdus and his alleged crimes if I initially thought he was on the run from the Army?
From internet news reports.
Yes, 2002 was recent enough to have Internet news. But the paper farthest from Stinnett that carried the story?
The Oklahoman.
And that’s a story about a man in the same position as Collier in the same town as Collier who was charged with the same alleged crime as Collier — plus a dozen more, including one that’s sinister when compared to adultery. (Which, by the way, is not against Texas or federal penal codes.)
The difference from then to now is social media and how it’s reprogrammed our brains to scroll endlessly in search of schadenfreude. We’re an angry society now because of it.
“I’ve been cheated on,” we say. “I’ve been lied to, and I loathe the vile piece of shit who did those things to me. I wish I could’ve let the whole world know. I wanted him stoned in the town square. I missed my chance then, but I can do it now to this Jason Collier guy and get the justice I’m owed!”
I do the same sometimes. No judgment here.
But the news media knows this is how we are now, and they’re encouraging it for their own gain. They’re supposed to provide us with the information needed to be a better society. At least, that’s what I was taught in J-school.
But now news organizations are constantly looking for ways to profit from our pain.
And I was part of getting them there.
FML.
