Ira Silverman

TV news has always had an ambivalent relationship toward investigative journalism. Elite reportorial "SWAT teams" have been formed with fanfare and later quietly abandoned because such reporting requires what TV lacks: time. Following a paper trail is hardly great video, and even the best investigators regularly come back empty-handed.

Ira D. Silverman, 46, a former executive vice president of the American Jewish Committee. Silverman served as executive vice president of the Jewish human rights and advocacy group for two years. He resigned last year because of a parasitic illness he contracted while visiting China but continued as head of the committee's Institute for Human Relations, said Walter Gips, the committee's national treasurer.

Ira D. Silverman, 46, a former executive vice president of the American Jewish Committee. Silverman served as executive vice president of the Jewish human rights and advocacy group for two years. He resigned last year because of a parasitic illness he contracted while visiting China but continued as head of the committee's Institute for Human Relations, said Walter Gips, the committee's national treasurer.

TV news has always had an ambivalent relationship toward investigative journalism. Elite reportorial "SWAT teams" have been formed with fanfare and later quietly abandoned because such reporting requires what TV lacks: time. Following a paper trail is hardly great video, and even the best investigators regularly come back empty-handed.

An NBC attorney attempted Friday to persuade federal appeals court judges in Pasadena to strike down the largest libel verdict against an American news organization--a $5.3-million judgment that the network defamed singer Wayne Newton in newscasts that linked him to organized crime figures. NBC lawyer Floyd Abrams said the stories were the product of aggressive reporting, not ill will, and should be protected by the First Amendment. But Newton's lawyer, Morton R.

Entertainer Wayne Newton has asked a federal appeals court to uphold his historic $5.3-million jury award growing out of NBC News reports that he was linked to organized crime figures. Newton's attorney has filed a 120-page brief with the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, saying that overturning the award would have "dire consequences to the public."

A federal jury began deliberations Wednesday in entertainer Wayne Newton's multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuit against NBC after Newton's attorney accused the network of a "total absence of institutional conscience." The jury deliberations began eight weeks after a panel of six jurors and four alternates was chosen to weigh Newton's claim that his reputation was damaged by NBC reports in 1980 and 1981 linking him to organized crime figures.

Seven-year-old Carla Reyes shut her eyes and grimaced when a nurse pricked her index finger to draw a small sample of blood. But her mother, Silvia Reyes, said the checkups Sunday afternoon were well worth the pain Carla and her two sisters endured during the Latino Health Fair at Del Sol Park in Oxnard's La Colonia district.

A former state gaming agent who later worked for singer Wayne Newton testified that he warned two NBC newsmen they were "barking up the wrong tree" if a network news report linked the entertainer with organized crime. Former state Agent Lon Shepard told a federal jury hearing evidence in Newton's defamation suit against NBC that he met with NBC reporter Brian Ross and producer Ira Silverman in a Las Vegas bar.

Jurors completed a second day of deliberations without a verdict Thursday in the federal civil trial of singer Wayne Newton's defamation suit claiming that a series of 1980-81 NBC news reports wrongly linked him to organized crime. The jurors, who will resume deliberations this morning, viewed a two-hour videotape of Newton's 1980 appearance before Nevada gaming authorities considering him for a license to own 50% of the Aladdin Hotel.

An early tip-off enabled NBC News to be all over the story Wednesday when customs officials in England arrested five people as 40 U.S.-made nuclear triggers were about to be smuggled to Iraq on a flight from Heathrow Airport near London. U.S. and British customs agents for 18 months had been investigating the ring involved in the smuggling effort. The ring had also been under surveillance by Brian Ross and Ira Silverman--the ace investigative team that NBC insiders have dubbed "Batman and Robin."

With the November ratings sweeps fast approaching, NBC moved Friday to shore up its faltering prime-time lineup by substituting the legal drama "Matlock" for its low-rated news series, "Real Life With Jane Pauley" and "Expose." "Matlock," a 5-year-old series that stars Andy Griffith, will be broadcast Fridays at 8 p.m. beginning next week, but "Real Life" and "Expose" will have one more airing together on Nov. 1.