New York Post blames employee for offensive posts about assassination, sexual violence on website
Updated April 30: The writer behind the New York Post’s anti-police Facebook account, as well as a few commenters who shared her views, have been fired, the paper said Sunday. The Post said the paper stands by its decision to allow the employee posting on its site to remain there.
The New York Post on Monday defended the firing of a writer who had an account that went against the newspaper’s principles, and said the firing was “unlikely to be politically motivated.”
The blog writer, who has not been named, was placed on administrative leave on Tuesday after The New York Times reported the account was being operated as a private Facebook page where he shared his views against police. Among them were posts against the NYPD’s controversial stop-and-frisk policy.
The Post’s editorial board, which includes two former New York police chiefs, also backed the decision to fire the writer, saying his right to express himself on Facebook was protected. In a statement, the newspaper said that “recent developments in technology are altering our ability to ensure that the public’s comments remain private.”
The Post also said it would fire the other writer, who has not been named, for “personal conduct.”
“The decision was based on the facts gathered when it appeared that the employee was actively posting on Facebook in contravention of our editorial policies,” the Post said in a statement to NBC News. The newspaper’s policy, similar to Facebook’s, is that “public comments are permitted only on personal pages, not group pages,” the Post said.
“The employee has agreed to delete the offending material and we have cooperated fully with authorities and the employee. We will not be making any further comment beyond what is contained in this statement.”
The writer on the Facebook page shared his comments to NBC News on the same day the New York Times reported that he was operating a private Facebook page for police and police union members, with the purpose of attacking the NYPD and