When I was a newspaperman, there was a cynical quip that made the round of newsrooms. It was used by some editors when a neophyte reporter messed up a story badly. It went something like this: “Well, at least he didn’t let the facts get in the way of a good story.”

It was intended as a kind of sick humor, a comic relief device to help ease the strain generated by a failure to measure up to professional standards. Most of the time there is really nothing very amusing about a newspaper story that is inaccurate or misleading. People get hurt. Reputations become compromised. The truth element becomes skewed and the public interest is not served.

Recently the Bangor Daily News ran a front-page story that revisited the accidental shooting of Hermon resident Karen Wood by a deer hunter in 1988. Written by outdoor columnist John Holyoke, the story was well-intended, a vivid reminder to all deer hunters to hunt safely.

But the story was not entirely accurate. Worse, it perpetuated a subtle but significant media mistake of 25 years ago.

Flashback. At the time, I was managing editor at the BDN. Of course, we covered the story, along with a large contingent of TV and news reporters from all over the country. A central issue in the shooting accident was this: Where was the young mother when she was shot and killed by the deer hunter? Most of the other state and national media, including the “big three” TV networks, reported that Wood was shot “in her back yard” while hanging laundry. Having personally talked with a spokesman for the investigating officer at the scene then, I knew otherwise. Wood’s body was found in the woods, a good distance from her lawn. Beside her was a pair of white mittens, which she may have been waving at the hunter.

Our own staff reporters, in their first story drafts, reported that Wood was “shot in her own back yard.” As the editor, I contended that, regardless of what the national media did, we should stick with the facts. She was not shot in her back yard. We would report the story accordingly. She was shot in the woods behind her home, not in her own back yard. Eyes rolled in the newsroom. As the only deer hunter involved in the newsroom, I guess my motives were suspect.

A quarter century later, we still have conflicting reports. John Holyoke, in his page one story of Nov. 14, 2013, writes: “Karen Wood was shot in her own back yard.”

Was she, really?

In his final book, Birds of a Feather, the late Paul Fournier has a different take. Paul, at the time of the shooting, was the spokesman for the Maine Warden Service and was at the tragic scene working with the investigating officers. Paul’s words: “Sad as the shooting was, the media portrayal of the incident was not a true picture … rather than being on her lawn, the woman had actually walked through a strip of woods behind her home to the edge of a logged area. From the shooter’s position, the house was not visible, screened by a buffer strip of woods separating the house from the “chopping.” And the hunter had been well beyond the thousand-foot legal safety zone from the house. These were the facts — facts that the frenzied media ignored.”

Yes, facts do matter, but there is no escaping the other overriding fact that is not a matter of dispute. An innocent woman died because of one tragic mistake by a negligent hunter. For all of us who hunt with firearms, the Karen Wood story serves as a somber reminder of what can happen if we don’t think before we act.

The author is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal. He is also a Maine Guide, co-host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network (WVOM-FM 103.9, WQVM-FM 101.3) and former information officer for the Maine Dept. of Fish and Wildlife. His e-mail address is paul@sportingjournal.com . He has two books “A Maine Deer Hunter’s Logbook” and his latest, “Backtrack.” Online information is available at www.maineoutdoorpublications.com or by calling Diane at 207-745-0049.

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