The fun of being a reporter

Friday, October 19, 2007



There are some stories that are just really hard to do and this week, one of them fell onto my list.

Well, to be honest, I grabbed it for my list by deciding I'd find the mother of the man who was tasered at Vancouver Airport. And, after a call to a contact, who made another call and then another call and then another call -- she had a first name and a phone number.

Reverse directory provided last name and an address. No answer to a phone call meant head on down and do that thing we dread to do: knock on the door of a grieving parent and try to do our job.

Zofia Cisowski, however, opened her door told me her story, as much as therapy for her, I think, as it was to let people know that something was very, very wrong with the way her son had been treated by police who confronted him, tried to calm him down (not realizing he spoke no English), tasered him and then watched as he fell to the floor, dead.

A colleague said later his journalism teachers taught that, when dealing with a subject who is emotional, to stay calm, separate and just wait it out. Probably good advice for someone starting in the business -- we don't want them to start crying the minute their subject does -- but for me, the mother side took over and I stopped asking questions and just hugged Zofia as she cried.

It's not the first time I've done this kind of story. In fact, throughout my 30-plus year career as a reporter, I've had to do it more times than I wanted to. But then once is too many.

The next day, I stopped in to see how she was doing and return a photograph she had lent me to use with my story. Zofia had accidentally dropped her purse and all the contents were strewn over the livingroom floor. And she was crying. Just crying.

So I put the photo back in the small shrine she's created in memory of her son, got down on the floor, picked everything up and put it on her table. I asked if she needed anything, asked a couple of questions I needed for the story and then had to stare down a very big, very angry Polish man who decided that I was a leech taking advantage of a distraught woman.

It wasn't an argument I was going to get involved in, other than to tell him I didn't appreciate his choice of words. Because, by not following my young friend's caution from his teacher, but in letting my own emotions lead the interviews, I don't think I was using Zofia.

I'd like to think she was using me, and every other media person she's talked to, in an effort to find the truth behind why her son is dead.

1 comments: to “ The fun of being a reporter so far...

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    Thanks Dale for your story today in the paper. I was Zofia's English teacher when she came to Kamloops 8 years ago and we've been in contact ever since. 3 weeks ago, we met at the grocery store and Zofia told me how happy she was because Robert was finally coming to live in Canada. I was so happy for her because her dream was going to be fulfilled soon - no more distance between her and Robert, her only child. Now he's gone. What a horrible tragedy! I'm glad you feel like you were helping her. I know you were. Our community needs to know who she is and the turmoil she is going through so that we all can act with compassion and help her through this. Right now, I'm contacting all my contacts looking for help for her to send Robert's body back to Poland for burial, rather than having him cremated. How horrible it must be for her to agonize on this decision. Thanks again, Blaine Young, Kamloops