NY Post,June 7, 1990

Checking It Out
State Crime Victims Board wants to know if WNYW paid for Robert Golub interview
by JILL BROOKE & MARSHA KRANES

The New York State Crime Victims Board plans to subpoena records from WNYW/Ch. 5's "A Current Affair" to investigate whether the producers illegally paid convicted murderer Robert Golub for an interview that will be broadcast next Monday. Golub was sentenced to 25-years-to-life in jail last Friday for the grisly mutilation murder of his 13-year-old Valley Stream neighbor, Kelly Ann Tinyes.

Sources said the syndicated program agreed to contribute $5,000 to Golub's defense in exchange for the exclusive jailhouse interview with the 23-year-old Long Island killer. Such a payment would violate the state's Son of Sam law, which prohibits convicts from profiting from their crimes and mandates that all proceeds be turned over to the board to benefit crime victims and their families.

According to a source at "A Current Affair," the money was paid to Golub's father, John.

But Everett Mayhew, senior attorney for the Crime Victims Board, says such a payment would be illegal, since Golub senior would be his son's assignee or representative. "We want to make sure that no monies were paid to relatives for the interview," eh said.

Officially, a spokesman for "A Current Affair" denied that the station paid any money to Golub or his family. The spokesman added that the show did not "violate any state law in obtaining or conducting this interview. Neither 'A Current Affair' nor its representatives paid any money whatsoever to Robert Golub, or his defense fund or his attorney."

According to one industry insider, "Paying for interviews is standard procedure for entertainment shows. Paying someone else who is not a criminal happens all the time. It's a competitive marketplace and the exclusive interviews help ratings."

According to the staff member at "Current Affair," a friend a Robert Chambers was paid $10,000 two years ago for a video which showed the preppie murderer choking a doll. "The person who had the videotape wasn't part of the trial so this was completely legal," the staffer said.

There have been other instances of payments for exclusive interviews. In 1975, CBS' "60 Minutes" paid Watergate figure G. Gordon Liddy $15,000 for an interview.

"That was the first and last time we did that," said '60 Minutes' executive producer Don Hewitt. Earlier, another Watergate insider, H.R. Haldemann, was paid $1000,000 to be interviewed for a special CBS News report with Mike Wallace as the correspondent.

CBS, like ABC and NBC, have strict guidelines prohibiting payment for interviews or news sources who are not criminals. The network is allowed only to go as far as picking up the tab for transportation and hotel arrangements. However, syndicated programs like "A Current Affair," "Hard Copy" and "Entertainment Tonight" are not subject to the same restrictions.

"For some reasons, writers are horrified that people get paid for voicing their thoughts but they never get outraged that people get paid for unburdening themselves on paper," said Hewitt. "I'm not sure I understand that, but when money changes hands it sounds sleazy. We don't do it."