Petrelis Files

Queerty Omits BAR, FOIA Filer
From Milk/Moscone FBI Story

The princesses with (unearned) attitude at Queerty today omitted proper credit to the newspaper that broke the story this week about what was in the thousands of pages released by the FBI a few months back.

Queerty fails to note that Matthew Bajko of the Bay Area Reporter is the writer who looked over the FBI files and it's his reporting that Queerty uses for what readers may think is original coverage by the snarky site. Click here to read Bajko's reporting that Queerty is too cheap to credit.

What else does Queerty fail to inform readers of? Exactly how the files came to be made public by the FBI. It's not that the federal agency just decided out of the blue to release the thousands of new pages. Nope, it took it a Freedom of Information Act request from me to get those documents.

Here's the crucial detail from Bajko about the now-available for public inspection new files on Harvey Milk, George Moscone and Dan White:

The Bay Area Reporter obtained the latest documents from local blogger and gay activist Michael Petrelis, who in early 2010 filed a federal Freedom of Information Act request with the FBI for any material the agency possessed on the three deceased San Francisco politicians. After the FBI released an initial batch of 60 pages to Petrelis last year, the agency contacted him again because more documents had been discovered. ...

If folks don't read the BAR story and depend only upon the snark princesses at Queerty for the full details about how the new files came to public light, they might think the FBI just fell from a stork flying in the sky.

Queerty should learn how to give full credit for stories they crib from other sources, reference FOIA and its importance, and provide basic info on how FBI files related to Harvey Milk are now open for the community to read. Should they need lessons in better reporting, Queerty can learn from that from the BAR writer.

This is an excellent time for me to say what I've said to Bajko in phone conversations. Thank you, Matthew and the BAR, for not only poring over the many pages of the new documents, but for also writing an excellent well-rounded and informative piece, while further sharing some of the new pages that are the basis for the story.