The Transition

Life tends to be cyclical because everything-from fashion to music to economics—eventually returns.

From  a  Bronx  tenement  to  marriage,  children, professional   success  in   television  newsfilm, immigration  to  Israel,   re-marriage,  two  more children and  a return to the  United States and a new facet of journalism—print.

Just as during  our current recession, unemployment was  rampant  during  the  late  1970’s  and  early 1980’s.  I became  a statistic—unable  to work  in television newsfilm because  it had been superceded by videotape—unable to work with videotape because of a classic “Catch-22”  situation; you had to have a job to be accepted into  the union and you had to be in the union in order to get a job.

My former  union, the Motion  Picture Film Editors, Local   771  of   the  International   Alliance  of Theatrical   Stage  Employees   (IATSE),  had  been devastated  by NABET,  the National  Association of Broadcasting Engineering Technicians.

This quandary  came about because  film in TV  news had  become  an  anachronism—a  victim of American technology combined with Japanese ingenuity. During three  years overseas,  22 years  of TV  journalism experience  disappeared  beneath  a  tidal  wave of progress.

The Ohio State University’s  School of Journalism in Columbus, Ohio  came to the rescue  with an offer to earn a master’s degree  while maintaining a salaried assistantship in their television news workshop.

It was  during this intense  year of work  and study that  Dale Nolan  Johnston was  arrested, tried  and convicted  for  the  dismemberment  murders  of  his stepdaughter, Annette  Cooper, and her  fiancé, Todd Schultz.

As  part of  an  OSU  Department of  Photography and Cinematography  project,  I  was  asked  to  edit an undergraduate   project  documenting   the  murders, indictment and trial.

That program, “Reasonable  Doubt,” later received the Cincinnati Blue Chip Public Access Award as the best television documentary of 1986.

It   was   this   production   that   whetted   my journalistic  instinct  to  continue investigating this unique case involving possible involvement by a satanic coven.

Dale Johnston  was convicted of  the two aggravated murders and sentenced to die in the electric chair. His  conviction by  a three-judge  panel was  later reversed  by the  Ohio  Court  of Appeals  and that decision was subsequently  upheld by Ohio’s Supreme Court.

Evidence showed that  the prosecution had presented  a  purely  circumstantial  case  and  had  erred by withholding evidence favorable to the defendant. It also presented testimony of a previously hypnotized witness with whom, the appellate court said, proper safeguards to avoid tainted  testimony had not been followed.

Although   Hocking  County   refused  to  prosecute Johnston  for a  second  time,  many believe  he is still guilty of that heinous crime. However, the original  question still remained: Was there a reasonable doubt?