NYT Delays Reporting Shooter Targeted Christians Until Several Hours Later

October 2nd, 2015 4:20 PM

Thursday evening, news broke that the Oregon school shooter had questioned students about their faith before he shot them. Later Thursday, The New York Post reported an incredible detail: Christian students were specifically singled out by the shooter. By Friday morning, all three networks had told viewers of that nightmare scenario on their morning shows. The Washington Post and The LA Times followed up with the story shortly after.

But, for some reason, one notable media outlet was silent for the majority of Friday -- The New York Times.

The Washington Post recounted the story that many others picked up but The Times initially ignored:

In one classroom, he appeared to single out Christian students for killing, according to witness Anastasia Boylan.

“He said, ‘Good, because you’re a Christian, you’re going to see God in just about one second,'” Boylan’s father, Stacy, told CNN, relaying his daughter’s account while she underwent surgery to treat a gunshot to her spine.

“And then he shot and killed them.”

Another account came from Autumn Vicari, who described to NBC Newswhat her brother J.J. witnessed in the room where the shootings occurred. According to NBC: “Vicari said at one point the shooter told people to stand up before asking whether they were Christian or not. Vicari’s brother told her that anyone who responded ‘yes’ was shot in the head. If they said ‘other’ or didn’t answer, they were shot elsewhere in the body, usually the leg.”

These eyewitness accounts revealed an alleged hateful motive for the shooting; and we all know how much the left loves to hype hate crimes. But The New York Times didn’t find this hate crime newsworthy, and not one of its stories Friday morning mentioned it. Not until late Friday afternoon did the paper bother to report this detail -- and it was under the guise of a pro-gun control headline, at that.

But all through the morning and early afternoon, this important detail was left out of The Times’ reporting. This morning’s front page article on the shooting, for instance, contained only one vague mention to the shooter’s possible motive:

“Law enforcement officials said one witness had told them that the gunman, Mr. Mercer, had asked about people’s religions before he began firing.” [emphasis added]

The paper quickly moved on and didn’t give any more details. But maybe The Times would update after virtually every other newspaper wrote about it?

Hardly. Mid-morning Friday, the paper added one more online article to accompany their print story, entitled “Chris Harper Mercer, Oregon Gunman, Is Recalled as a Recluse Close to His Mother.”

The Times seemed to care more about the shooter’s relationship to his mother and his anti-social behavior than to any anti-Christian motivation he may have had for committing the crime.

This was as close as The Times got to mentioning the shooter’s beliefs:

“A picture of Mr. Mercer also appeared on a long-dormant dating website profile registered in Los Angeles. On it, he described himself as an ‘introvert’ with a dislike for ‘organized religion.’” [emphasis added]

And what organized religion could that be? The Times didn’t seem to find that worth investigating.

So, are the journalists at one of the leading newspapers in the country really bad at doing their job or really good at trying to hide the truth? You decide.