Ethics .... what would you have done?

Within the last month, I was put in quite an ethical dilemma. Certainly ethics come in to play just about every day, but on a scale of 1-10, this was a 15 for me. I'm wondering what some of you would have done. Unfortunately, I'll have to be a bit cryptic here, but I'll try to paint the picture for you.

I got a tip from a reliable source that a Northeast Ohio police department was assigning its officers to make routine stops at a private business. When I say "routine" I mean officers were required to go by there several times a shift, 24/7. The source told me that the required checks were keeping the officers from being able to cover their own beats the way they should and amounted to free security for the business itself. "If a private business wants extra security," the source told me, "why don't they hire their own rent-a-cops like everyone else."

I checked some basic patrol information and found no mention of these patrol checks anywhere. If it was mandatory that the officers spend time at that company then I suspected it was being forced under the radar. My first thought was that someone with political influence might be helping out a business friend who couldn't afford the added $$ for security. I really never entertained any thoughts that the business might be corrupt or that the officers were being used to protect the bad guys (think Al Capone) because there were just too many officers being used in the coverage.

I eventually started asking some police sources about it and found out that plenty of folks knew about the patrols and even acknowledged taking part in them, but no one would tell me why.

Finally, my phone rang from a high-ranking public official who said we needed to talk off-the-record immediately. OTR is not a place I usually like to go, but considering I had no idea at the time why he was even calling I agreed.

He asked me -- make that begged me -- to stop pursuing the story about the added patrols. I asked him how he'd heard about my inquiry at his level, and he said, "you're name is floating in every backroom in government right now and you have people terrified." I sat there for a second and wondered what the heck I'd stumbled on to this time.

"OK," I said, "but you've got to give me at least one good reason here because these are employees on tax payer $$ who are being used like private security guards around the clock."

He paused for a moment and added, "what's your military security clearance?"

OH HELL! WHAT FIRESTORM DID I SPARK NOW? "Top Secret," I told him.

"Then you should know that that business is one of the top Ohio targets for Al Qaida or other terrorists and no I'm not kidding."

I sat there to compose my thoughts. Shouldn't the public be made aware of this target? Shouldn't people have a right to know what's in their backyard? Shouldn't the federal government be involved here? Wouldn't Bob Woodward jump on this with both feet and never stop typing until it brought down the President?

"If it's this much of a target," I asked, "why don't they have their own super security or something?"

"Because the federal government doesn't have the dollars to protect it, so it's up to us," he told me. "I really need your help here Eric."

I did some additional research and checked the company by a secondary name which validated what he told me about the business and what goes on inside those walls.

I discussed the information with one confidant at the station and decided to walk away from exposing it on TV News. Ethically I couldn't bring myself to illuminate a target to bad guys watching at home and on the Internet. There's just too much at stake, especially when so many good people are involved in protecting the place. I guess it would have been a bigger story if the target existed and NE Ohio law enforcement knew about the threat and wasn't providing security.

I'm hanging on to my research in case something happens there in the future, but I'm not pursuing it as an on-air story. It's hard to put time into a story that you know viewers would be glued to watching and would generate a ton of conversation and follow-up stories. Still, in my heart, I know I've made the right call here.

Other reporters may have chosen a different path. I remember a competitor telling me once, "what you call 'ethics' Mansfield, I call 'exclusive.'" "You're right," I told her. "And I that's how I live with myself."