CHAPTER 8 THE HISTORY OF RADIO RANDY : I'M GONNA FIRE-BOMB YOUR RADIO STATION!

 

Headed for Kentucky.

Opal, the receptionist at WWXL buzzed my office with a chilling message: Mr. Bliss, Mr. Sizemore is on the line for you. Uh, THAT Mr. Sizemore I asked?

Yes, she said and he is pissed. OK, put him thru I said. I picked up the phone and said hello and he only said one sentence to me, and it was: If I hear any more stories on your station about a change of venue for my trial, I will fire- bomb your radio station.

Who was Mr. Sizemore? Read the account:

On December 18, 1980, local independent coal truck drivers in Clay County, Kentucky met near the Big K Coal Company's processing plant to protest the company's hiring of out-of-state truck drivers to transport coal from the plant. Petitioner Sizemore, who owned an interest in the company, drove toward the plant, where he encountered ten to twelve truckers congregated on a roadway. Sizemore stepped from his truck, armed with a pistol. Willard Morris, a manager of Big K Coal Company, was also present and armed. The independent coal drivers testified at trial that they were unarmed, though Sizemore testified that the drivers were carrying guns. Shots were fired into the group of drivers, and two of them, Ernest Begley and Ray Broughton, were killed.

At the time the story broke I had a brand-new News Director at WWXL. He was just out of college and was full of fire and brimstone. He wanted to really get down and report the news. His name was Marc and I really liked him. It was sort of ironic I guess that we were the same age. I was on my second job in radio and he was fresh out of college.

As he covered the murders and began his reporting, he received a tip that the DA was seeking a change of venue out of Manchester for the trial. They believed Sizemore would be able to intimidate the jury pool into an acquittal. It was not his first go round with juries in the area as we came to learn.

Anyway, they were not able to get the change of venue and the result was predicable:

On December 19, 1980, a Clay County, Kentucky grand jury returned a two-count indictment against Sizemore, charging him with first degree murder in violation of Ky.Rev.Stat.Ann. § 507.020. Sizemore was tried before a Clay County Circuit Court jury in August 1982. The trial judge declared a mistrial when the jurors voted 11-1 in favor of acquittal but could not reach a unanimous verdict.

Following a change of venue, Sizemore was tried before a Lee County (Kentucky) Circuit Court jury in July 1983 and convicted on both counts of murder. The court sentenced Sizemore to two concurrent twenty-year terms.

I would like to say that as a crusading broadcaster that we did not back down to Mr. Sizemore’s’ threat to firebomb our station, but that is not what happened. After discussing the threat with the two owners, we agreed that we should cease reporting the story.

It was one of the most difficult decisions I had to make in my young career as a broadcaster. But the safety of our staff and our building was most important of course.

My tenure at WWXL as only a couple of months old at this point and sadly it would not be the only time, I had to decide on how to deal with serious threats.

The next time around it was personal.