Stanton and the Times were never 'in cahoots'

[LostInTime]

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The Rev. Charlie Martin is senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Indian Rocks, one of the biggest churches in the county. He said on television recently that I and the St. Petersburg Times were "in cahoots" with now-former Largo City Manager Steve Stanton about his plans for a sex change.

People may have assumed they were hearing the whole truth because the Rev. Martin is a good speaker with an authoritative delivery.
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We didn't talk again about his future - until Feb. 20, when a Times reporter and an editor walked into my office and said they had heard that Stanton was planning a sex change. They said that when they had asked Stanton about it, he had refused to talk to anyone but me - and only off the record.

After I scraped my jaw off the floor, I called Stanton and refused to grant him an off-the-record interview. I explained that as journalists, our job is to get important news into the paper for our readers, not carry it around in our heads. And a public figure's planning to get a sex change certainly was important news.