Court allows station to broadcast story
A struggle between the First Amendment and privacy rights of two Boston firefighters killed in the line of duty ended yesterday with a court allowing a Boston television station to broadcast its story, 24 hours after its competitors had already done so.
Shortly before 5 p.m., Appeals Court Judge Andrew Grainger dissolved an injunction that had barred WHDH-TV from broadcasting a story Wednesday about autopsy findings that showed two firefighters had alcohol or illegal drugs in their systems when they died fighting a fire Aug. 29 in a West Roxbury restaurant.
Grainger's two-sentence order did not explain his reasons for the ruling, but during oral arguments he indicated that publication of the information by other news outlets made the ban on Channel 7 moot. "It landed on my doorstep [yesterday] when I went to get the paper," the judge said from the bench.
Station owner Ed Ansin applauded Grainger's decision.
"This is very important to us," said Ansin, owner of Sunbeam Television Corp., which owns WHDH, by telephone. "Fundamentally, it's a First Amendment issue. This is a very important matter. It goes to the heart of the First Amendment."
Ansin said the station planned to "report everything we have" on last night's broadcasts.
Paul Hynes, lawyer for the Boston firefighters union, which obtained the injunction, could not be reached for comment after Grainger's ruling.
During oral argument, Hynes suggested the union, Local 718, was prepared to continue its legal challenges, but he did not make it clear how.
Paul J. Cahill, 55, of Scituate and Warren J. Payne, 53, of Newton were killed Aug. 29 in a blaze at the Tai Ho Mandarin and Cantonese Restaurant in West Roxbury.
On Wednesday, Hynes and the union convinced Superior Court Judge Merita Hopkins the station violated state law preventing disclosure of autopsy reports when it obtained the information about the firefighters.
Hynes made that point again in court yesterday and said the union wants an investigation into who disclosed the information to the station.
In response to questions from the Globe, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said in e-mail that his office did not intend to investigate who leaked the information. His spokesman, Jake Wark, said state law on disclosure of autopsy reports does not carry criminal penalties.
"Like most other residents of Boston, I am aware of the coverage and rumors surrounding the firefighters' autopsies," he said. He said autopsy reports are private medical records and prosecutors are not permitted to disclose them.
He also said his office continues to investigate the fire, but that it does not see any criminal wrongdoing.
"There is no evidence at this time to suggest that arson or other criminal wrongdoing caused the fire, and there are no plans to open a grand jury investigation into the matter," he wrote.
Conley added that the public should remember the sacrifices the two firefighters and their families have made, and are making.
"They were men with all the frailties and strengths of the human condition," he wrote. "They were loved by friends and families and fellow firefighters, and each man's absence leaves a void that can never be filled. They died as heroes, and that is how we will always remember them."
In its Wednesday night broadcasts, Channel 7 complied with the judge's order while other Boston media outlets, including the Boston Globe, reported the autopsy findings.
Michael T. Gass, the station's lawyer, contended on the station's behalf that Hopkins's order was an unconstitutional prior restraint on the station's exercise of its First Amendment rights to free speech.
Johnny Diaz of the Globe staff contributed to this report. 