Stubbing Your Toe on the Truth.
By Jim Conley • Mar 12th, 2007 • Email This Post to a Friend •
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So how has it come to pass that we know that there is a court case alleging a conspiracy to sell stolen goods by an employee of Food Center Liquors in Brookline Village? Well, it comes from an enterprising journalism student at Northeastern University, Preston Croteau.
Young Preston was assigned to cover an item on a court docket and came upon the Food Center case at Brookline Municipal Court. He started calling around town government to get the official reaction to the case, and received a collective ho hum.
Indeed, according to his report, he was told by Selectman’s Chair Robert L. Allen, Jr. that the store would probably just have its license suspended. (That’s an odd reaction, coming from a guy who has to leave the room every time Food Center shows up in the Selectman’s hearing room.)
But Preston had been researching problems with liquor stores in other communities and couldn’t understand why Brookline Town Government saw this as “no big deal.” So he kept digging, thinking that he had stumbled onto something more than a simple arrest. And it could be that it’s much more than that.
Just when you start to worry about the future of reporting, along comes an apprentice who trusts his gut (i.e., there’s more to this story than they’re letting on) and keeps pressing until he gets another view, not taking an official’s word as fact.
I can think of a couple of correspondents who might want to shadow Preston as he works.
Jim Conley is publisher of On Brookline.
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I nominate Preston Croteau for the 2007 I.F. Stone Journalism Award for Brookline Reporting.
As for Chair Bobby Allen, is he pre-judging a matter that he will not be passing judgment on for reasons revealed on this Blog? Is this a signal of his views to the other four Selectmen who may pass judgment, making a wink or a nod unnecessary?
Is the Smokehouse and the food center ever going to trial?