DAYTONA BEACH -- For the second time in three days, a young man has been murdered in Daytona Beach, the latest about 5 a.m. Tuesday, felled by a gunshot wound to the chest. And while Police Chief Michael Chitwood made himself available to TV camera crews and a News-Journal videographer, he and his assigned PIOs continued carrying out his spiteful vendetta of cutting us off from the news because our investigative story on his promotion of a supervisor ho allegedly mistreated women cops, won two awards in the recent Florida Press Club journalism competition.
As someone who has covered breaking news in Daytona Beach and throughout Volusia County dating back to the mid-1990s, I have never come across behavior like this by a public official, a chief of police no less. It is my contention that Chitwood and his PIOs violated the law by ignoring our public records requests for the initial homicide incident reports for the Tuesday killing and the shooting death that occurred Saturday night. It is also our contention that he purposely avoided having a press release placed on the city's website Tuesday, if one was even done at all.
By these deliberate acts and he and his assigned PIOs not taking our calls or answering our e-mails, he impeded our first amendment rights to report the news. It was deliberate and calculating. He knows all too well we are a small media outlet with barely enough advertising revenue to provide for our family. The adverse publicity from his bullying could hurt our advertising even more unless the city officials put a stop to this. We are pursuing all legal remedies to protect our rights.
Several insiders have told me Chitwood'a incensed that the Newcomb story is twice anchored on the bottom of our home page along with snapshots of the awards for general news writing and public safety reporting. According to our sources, Chitwood was even more upset when he was told I won two other awards as well, more than any other reporter in the state.
It's disheartening to me that City Manager Jim Chisholm has not stepped in and put a stop to this. Chitwood has no right to trample on the press, regardless of his personal grudges.
What newly-elected Mayor Derrick Henry, other elected officials and the public will soon learn from my continued reporting is Newcomb isn't the only high-ranking official he's going to have to answer for.
Instead of trying to beat on us, Chitwood needs to address the dirty stuff in his own department because as has been demonstrated with the two homicides, the gun violence and drug situation in Daytona Beach could get out of hand really quick.