Getting It Wrong: The Richard Jewell Case

Richard Jewell, 44, the security guard falsely suspected in the 1996 Centennial Olympic Park bombing, died Aug. 29. Jewell first was hailed as a hero for spotting a suspicious backpack and moving people away from a bomb. Later, he was named by news organizations as the focus of the investigation. After 88 days in the news, he was cleared. The Newseum interviewed Jewell in 2005. Watch an excerpt.

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[NoReligionInSchool]

not only was he wrongly accussed, there were so many personal attacks on him. Major news organizations and morning talk shows making fat jokes, cop wannabe jokes. completely terrorized this poor guy.

[eviltman]

poor guy. those reporters were assholes. and the FBI. think people. if someone wanted to kill and injure people with a bomb, why would he or she WARN people about the bomb???

[LukeL007]

@southerngrizzly I am sure he was under a ton of stress from everything that happened, that alone can trigger diabetes and heart disease.

[ALDEREK59]

 When I first saw him on TV I predicted that he would be the scapegoat if they could not find the real bomber quickly! I told my family "They're gonna blame that guy--- you just watch and see!" I just knew it!

[southerngrizzly]

@wowhornby true that, if you only could have seen him before he died though, he looked nothing like this, the media only releases pictures of him when he was big, so that people can make fun of him of course, he got into a pretty sad shape, what happens when you ignore the fact you have diabetes, regardless, he was a great person, THE most friendly and kind person you could ever meet no matter who he was around

[southerngrizzly]

i loved my uncle... he is missed

[mudylafeet]

RIP Richard Jewell

[BlueReishiMan]

@eviltman The argument at the time was "He's a nobody cop who planted this bomb so he could find it later and make himself look like a hero. But were so smart, were on to his trickery. The FBI told us so!!"

[redmustang03]

Poor guy he never did anything and it was Eric Rudolph that did it after he was caught years later. Too bad he died in 2007 from complications of obesity. I mean he was never the same after he was falsely accused.

[masterpete24]

@vp1981ad born in 62 so he clearly was 35 not in his 40s

[PanchoVanilla1]

I'll be back with some very, VERY hard evidence about a guy named Jeffrey Beatty; hungry-for-work "anti-terrorist consultant" who on CNN and NBC predicted an attack and it being done with a dumpster - in an "outside area"... Interestingly enough, YouTube has been blowing out my attempts to post this to all of you! I am photographing this page now because I have tried many times to report this! I'm not a whacko, YouTube and Jeffrey Beatty are....