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| FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2015 file photo, Sean Penn speaks during a forum with young entrepreneurs during the IMF and World Bank annual meeting in Lima, Peru. Late Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016, Rolling Stone magazine published an interview that Guzman apparently gave to Penn in his hideout in Mexico months before his recapture. In the article and interview, Penn describes the complicated measures he took to meet the legendary drug lord. |
NEW YORK (AP) -- It was a big scoop, and one Rolling Stone may well regret.
The
magazine made stunning news over the weekend by revealing that actor
Sean Penn landed a rare interview last fall with the notorious drug lord
Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman while Guzman was on the run after escaping
through a tunnel from a maximum-security Mexican prison. Guzman was
recaptured Friday in Mexico after a shootout that killed five of his
associates and wounded one marine.
Penn's long
and often rambling essay, widely mocked on social media, included
comments from Guzman on everything from his childhood to his thoughts on
the drug trade.
It also raised questions of
ethics and judgment, namely whether Penn should have met secretly with
one of the world's most-wanted fugitives, whether the actor crossed the
line by giving Guzman approval over the article before it was published,
and whether Penn trivialized El Chapo's murderous past by asking him
such questions as "Do you have any dreams?" and "If you could change the
world, would you?"
A Rolling Stone spokeswoman did not immediately return requests for comment.
Penn's
story ran nine months after Rolling Stone retracted its discredited
story about a gang rape at a fraternity party at the University of
Virginia. The magazine was strongly criticized for relying too strongly
on the account of the alleged victim and failing to carry out basic
fact-checking. It is being sued for tens of millions of dollars by the
fraternity, former frat members and a university administrator.
Writing
for Rolling Stone, Penn acknowledged that Guzman was granted prior
approval over the article (Guzman requested no changes, according to the
actor), a violation of the commonly held rules of journalistic
integrity.
"Allowing any source control over a
story's content is inexcusable. The practice of pre-approval discredits
the entire story - whether the subject requests changes or not," Andrew
Seaman, chairman of the ethics committee of the Society of Professional
Journalists, said in a blog post titled "Rolling Stone Gathers No
Accolades."
"The writer, who in this case is
an actor and activist, may write the story in a more favorable light and
omit unflattering facts in an attempt to not to be rejected."
Penn,
an Oscar-winning actor who played a drug dealer in the 1985 movie "The
Falcon and the Snowman," has had news-making encounters in other
countries. In 2002, as the U.S. was threatening war against Saddam
Hussein's Iraq, Penn visited the country and met with senior officials.
He has also spoken with such foreign critics of the U.S. as Fidel Castro
and Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez.
Rolling
Stone has long mixed aggressive investigative and political reporting
with coverage of rock stars and other celebrities. Former staff writers
such as Greil Marcus and Jim DeRogatis have accused publisher Jann
Wenner of allowing undue input from interview subjects or interfering
with music reviews he found too negative about artists he likes.
"It's
unfortunately in keeping with Jann's tendency to ignore professional
scruples in an effort to curry favor with celebrities," said Robert
Draper, a correspondent for GQ and author of "Rolling Stone Magazine:
The Uncensored History," said of the El Chapo story.
