FOX News lawsuit over live coverage of suicide victim's kids saw

Children See Father's Suicide on Fox News
Courthouse News Service
By JAMIE ROSS

PHOENIX (CN) - Fox News' broadcast of a man's suicide left his three young children with post-traumatic stress disorder, their mother claims in court.

Angela Rodriguez sued News Corp., Fox Entertainment Group and Fox News Network, in Maricopa County Court.

She claims that after Fox showed the suicide on "Studio B with Shepard Smith," her children found it on YouTube and now are so depressed they can't even go to school.

"Studio B" broadcast parts of an 80-mile car chase involving the children's father, JoDon Romero, in and around Phoenix on Sept. 28, 2012.

When Romero jumped out of the car and began running through the desert with a gun, "Studio B's host, Shepard Smith, began saying over and over to 'get off,' meaning to turn off the broadcast so as to not broadcast the events that were about to happen," the complaint states. Romero shot himself in the head.

"This suicide was broadcast live nationally," the complaint states. "Because Fox News did not delay the broadcast by even a few seconds - despite Shepard Smith's pleas to stop the broadcast - every person in the country watching the program saw the driver shoot himself in the head.

"Notably, the local Fox affiliate, from whom 'Studio B' was receiving its live feed, was utilizing a several-second delay, Thus, viewers in the Phoenix area who were watching the incident unfold on the local Fox station (rather than on the Fox News national network) did not see the suicide, as the several-second delay enabled the local technicians to prevent the broadcast of the suicide."
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