The Wheeler Dealer office was on the second floor of an odd triangular building at Southeast 72nd and Sandy, above Fairley’s Pharmacy. It was, of course, just a front for the real business at hand – not that anyone was particularly fooled. In fact, the cops were onto them from the get-go. Shortly after Roger arrived in Portland he was talking to the owner of the Roseway movie theater, which was just across Sandy Boulevard. The manager said some DEA agents had stopped by asking if they could do a stakeout in his theater, and when he told them hell no they’d gone to the bar next door. So presumably there were surveillance cameras in the second floor of the bar.
Agreed. But it doesn't absolve Zaitz for his unconscionable reporting on Michael Francke/ Goldschmidt/Frank Gable. Where are the apologies from him and The Oregonian to the public, the Franckes, Gable, you?
I'm with you all the way, Jennifer. The joke I was trying to make was that these two guys, for all their journalistic huffing and puffing, completely struck out on the two biggest stories of their careers – Goldschmidt and Francke. In case there's any doubt here, I consider Zaitz's long and self-congratulatory piece on the Gable case back in 2005 – in which he concluded that Gable was guilty as charged and tried to make Kevin Francke out as crazy for raising questions about it – one of the most despicable examples of "investigative" reporting in the history of American journalism.
I remember you re-calling the story in Murder in Oregon, and describing/nailing it as "despicable". You might think/imagine he AND The Oregonian would take the opportunity of Gable's exoneration to say they were wrong and apologize publicly, given 30 years of suffering in prison on a made up story. But no. They act incredulous. It seems to me that Oregon's most infamous unsolved crimes/murders somehow involve state and local police and sheriff's deputies too.
I just keep hoping a new look up top in Oregon politics could open the door to cleaning house starting with Michael Franke's murder. Ellen Rosenblum was always a problem - her husband's newspaper was involved with sex trafficking that was also swept under the rug. How is your relationship with new corrections chief Mike Reese? 🙂
Zaitz didn't spend more than a few hours going through the state's and the defense's discovery which I provided him and Noelle Crombie, and NEVER looked at the work product from the drunken sot Bob Abel, or he would have found the damning interview of Linda Parker re: Scott McAlister's, "they fucked up, it was supposed to look like a suicide", or the alterations to records by lead investigator Larry Glover who had gone back and ADDED Frank Gables name to some of the tip sheets, or noted the fact that the State cops had Frank's phone records from the night of the murder that showed the calls made to him at the time of the murder, or the book of polygraphs and interviews done on 17 year old Jodie Swearingen. 22 polygraph exams!!! An elaborate game of CLUE but with real people and a real murder.
And then in Zaitz' hit piece in the Oregonian he lauds himself by stating that he had unprecedented access to files and information from the state never before seen outside of law enforcement, but never discloses what the information was! IF it was pertinent to the case against Frank, then the state would be in violation of discovery rules and that in itself would have been grounds for a mistrial going back to 2005 when their "deepest, most extensive investigation ever" came out in the "O" which overwhelmingly proved Frank's guilt! Hahahahahaha! Morons!
I'm getting blisters on my fingers so gotta' stop or I'm gonna' end up with a bigger comment than the substack!
At least with the current editor still in charge, the Oregonian will never acknowledge how badly they have disgraced themselves over the Francke case.
"crackerjack investigative reporters, Les Zaitz and Jim Long," Riiiiiggghhhttt. Repeaters. FTFY
Well, they may have completely blown the Goldschmidt and the Francke stories, but they got this one right. Credit where credit's due.
Agreed. But it doesn't absolve Zaitz for his unconscionable reporting on Michael Francke/ Goldschmidt/Frank Gable. Where are the apologies from him and The Oregonian to the public, the Franckes, Gable, you?
I'm with you all the way, Jennifer. The joke I was trying to make was that these two guys, for all their journalistic huffing and puffing, completely struck out on the two biggest stories of their careers – Goldschmidt and Francke. In case there's any doubt here, I consider Zaitz's long and self-congratulatory piece on the Gable case back in 2005 – in which he concluded that Gable was guilty as charged and tried to make Kevin Francke out as crazy for raising questions about it – one of the most despicable examples of "investigative" reporting in the history of American journalism.
I remember you re-calling the story in Murder in Oregon, and describing/nailing it as "despicable". You might think/imagine he AND The Oregonian would take the opportunity of Gable's exoneration to say they were wrong and apologize publicly, given 30 years of suffering in prison on a made up story. But no. They act incredulous. It seems to me that Oregon's most infamous unsolved crimes/murders somehow involve state and local police and sheriff's deputies too.
I just keep hoping a new look up top in Oregon politics could open the door to cleaning house starting with Michael Franke's murder. Ellen Rosenblum was always a problem - her husband's newspaper was involved with sex trafficking that was also swept under the rug. How is your relationship with new corrections chief Mike Reese? 🙂
Harumph, harumph!!!
Zaitz didn't spend more than a few hours going through the state's and the defense's discovery which I provided him and Noelle Crombie, and NEVER looked at the work product from the drunken sot Bob Abel, or he would have found the damning interview of Linda Parker re: Scott McAlister's, "they fucked up, it was supposed to look like a suicide", or the alterations to records by lead investigator Larry Glover who had gone back and ADDED Frank Gables name to some of the tip sheets, or noted the fact that the State cops had Frank's phone records from the night of the murder that showed the calls made to him at the time of the murder, or the book of polygraphs and interviews done on 17 year old Jodie Swearingen. 22 polygraph exams!!! An elaborate game of CLUE but with real people and a real murder.
And then in Zaitz' hit piece in the Oregonian he lauds himself by stating that he had unprecedented access to files and information from the state never before seen outside of law enforcement, but never discloses what the information was! IF it was pertinent to the case against Frank, then the state would be in violation of discovery rules and that in itself would have been grounds for a mistrial going back to 2005 when their "deepest, most extensive investigation ever" came out in the "O" which overwhelmingly proved Frank's guilt! Hahahahahaha! Morons!
I'm getting blisters on my fingers so gotta' stop or I'm gonna' end up with a bigger comment than the substack!
Yikes. It's worse than I thought. 😟
👍