Richard Jewell Dead at 44

Richard Jewell Dead at 44

www.usatoday.com

Lin Wood, Jewell's longtime attorney, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that he was "devastated" by the news. He described Jewell as "a dedicated public servant whose heroism the night of the Centennial Olympic Park bombing saved the lives of many people."

[Jewell's] very name became shorthand for a person accused of wrongdoing in the media based on scanty information.

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This has to be one of the saddest stories of the 20th Century. Jewell was a security guard at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics who saw an unattended backpack and helped to evacuate people from the area. A bomb located inside the backpack exploded killing one and injuring more than a hundred others.

Jewell was hailed as a hero by the media, but a few days later that changed when he was labeled as a suspect by the media and was hounded day and night as media set up camps outside his apartment.

He was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, but not before being subjected not only to constant harassment by the media, but searches of his home and interrogations by the FBI.

Eric Rudolph, who hid in the North Carolina mountains for five years, eventually confessed to that bombing and three others.

www.usatoday.com
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[edit on 2007/8/29 by GradyPhilpott]

Yes this is a sad story.

I remember this very well too and the poor guy was just treated like he was oswald every single day they were on his neck. Then when all was looking like they made a huge mistake, some News were STILL convinced he did it. I know he never even got so much as an apology from them.

The final tragedy the man who saved lives dies while the guilty party escapes the death penalty. The media outlets that were so fast to portray him as the guilty probably only escaped lawsuits because it wasn't feasible to sue every media outlet that ran the story.