Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Names and faces
A King County, Wash., judge has dismissed a lawsuit by a man who had sued for the release of graphic photos and other police records from the 1994 death of Kurt Cobain. Richard Lee, who runs a public-access show, Now See It Person To Person: Kurt Cobain Was Murdered, had sued Seattle and its Police Department for the release of records and photos under the state Public Records Act. On Friday, Superior Court Judge Theresa Doyle dismissed Lee’s lawsuit with prejudice because of procedural missteps. The judge ruled Lee had improperly served his lawsuit to the city, and failed to give the city an appropriate amount of time to respond to his records request. Lee says he plans to submit another records request and if the city does not turn over the photos, he will file another lawsuit. Cobain’s widow and daughter had sided with the city in seeking to keep the photos private. Cobain, frontman of the band Nirvana, was found dead of a self-inflicted shotgun wound in the head in his home on Lake Washington Boulevard East on April 8, 1994, according to the King County medical examiner’s office. He also had a lethal dose of heroin in his system. Lee, 51, has maintained over the years that Cobain was murdered through a conspiracy involving government officials. He thinks that releasing the photos of Cobain’s body would show that the singer did not have a gunshot wound. The city argued that the photos shouldn’t be released for the sake of the family’s privacy. Courtney Love Cobain, 51, and their daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, 22, had written declarations to the court about the physical and emotional effect the release of the graphic photos would have on their lives.
Dan Rather, 83, has quietly shut down the Dan Rather Reports newsmagazine he’d been making since leaving CBS News a decade ago and opened an independent production company, with seed money from AXS-TV founder Mark Cuban in exchange for a series of interviews with entertainers. Rather’s News & Guts firm is even working on a fiction series. The veteran broadcaster also has signed on for reporting and analysis at the website Mashable. Retirement? Not an option. “I love to work,” Rather said. “I have my flaws and I’ve made a lot of mistakes, but I’ve always loved covering news and I have a passion for covering news. I couldn’t see myself not doing it as long as I have my health.” He added, “I’d much rather wear out than rust out.”