What not to say in a press interview

You don’t ever tell the press that “A bad situation actually turned out to be somewhat of a good situation because of the bodies we recovered.” And, you don’t tell the press “I’m a firm believer that things happen for a reason,” after someone drowns and then you find other bodies in the process. (front page of CNN.com)

I understand the intentions of this well-meaning sheriff, but you can usually tell which sheriff departments have extensive media relations experience and training and which ones don’t. Take the Elizabeth Smart case as an example (the media relations part), which was coordinated amazingly well by Chris Thomas of the Intrepid Group. No matter what the media asked, the message they always heard was . . . “we just want to find Elizabeth.”

In the case of this sheriff I really believe he should have talked about how the families can now have closure and left it at that. Instead, he speculated (which you should never, ever do with the press) on why this tragedy happened.

photo credit: clgregor