The Virginia Citizens Defense League filed a lawsuit against current Yahoo! Global News anchor Katie Couric and the makers of "Under the Gun" after the gun rights organization was allegedly misrepresented during a nine-second silence edit in the documentary.
VCDL, along with two of its individual members, licensed firearms dealer Patricia Webb and firearms and personal defense litigator Daniel Haws, reportedly seek compensatory damages of $12 million and punitive damages of $350,000 per plaintiff.
As per the report of Washington Post, the complaints states "The Defendants manipulated the footage in service of an agenda: they wanted to establish that there is no basis for opposing background checks, by fooling viewers into believing that even a panel of pro-Second Amendment advocates could not provide one."
The documentary Under the Gun was released in May, tackling the state of gun violence and gun control laws in America. Couric, as the executive producer and narrator of the documentary, went into heaps of controversies following the nine-second pause edits in the documentary that was labeled as 'deliberate and deceptive' .
In the film, Couric asked representatives of VCDL "If there are no background checks for gun purchases, how do you prevent felons or terrorists from purchasing a gun?"
The film then proceeds to show nine seconds of stunned silence, depicting that the gun activists were unable to provide an answer.
In careful comparison, however, as reported by The Washington Free Beacon, the raw audio of the conversation and the resulting film yielded a consequential discrepancy. Couric's question was met with answers immediately rather than dumbfounded silence from the group.
VCDL president Philip Van Cleave reacted,"Katie Couric asked a key question during an interview with some members of our organization. She then intentionally removed their answers and spliced in nine seconds of some prior video of our members sitting quietly and not responding. Viewers are left with a misunderstanding that the members had no answer to her question."
Under the Gun director, Stephanie Soechtig explained that the pause was added as a dramatic effect to give the audience a moment to consider the question. She said, "My intention was to provide a pause for the viewer to have a moment to consider this important question before presenting the facts on Americans' opinions on background checks. I never intended to make anyone look bad and I apologize if anyone felt that way."
The defendants, however, are not happy with this, further stating in their complaints that although Couric and company admitted the intentional edits misrepresented VCDL, they continued distributing the film and refused to remove the "manipulative footage."
Van Cleave told Fox News, "Katie Couric has publicly admitted that the film, which was presented to VCDL as a 'documentary,' was misleading and misrepresented VCDL. However, Couric and the other filmmakers have refused to fix the film or to even stop promoting and distributing it. The only way to hold Couric accountable was to file a lawsuit."
Soechtig, however, stood up to her creative and editorial judgment, responding to the filed lawsuit, "I also think Katie is held to a journalistic standard, but this is a film, and I'm a filmmaker and it was my decision to do so."
Couric, on the other hand, has not commented on the issue yet.
Stay tuned for more updates!
