NY- The New York Post’s Page Six is terminating all freelance employees in a housecleaning triggered by the payola scandal surrounding the embattled gossip column.
Post spokesman Howard Rubenstein declined comment on the move except to say, “The editors will not discuss their internal management decisions.”
Hints of a cleanup came last week when Post Editor in Chief Col Allan said in a published report: “We are going to tighten ship.”
Freelance reporters Fernando Gil, Lisa Marsh, Christopher Tennant and Jared Paul Stern are the byline staffers who are being sacked.
Gil, Tennant and Stern declined comment. Marsh could not be reached.
All occupied the “fourth chair” in the line of Page Six desks manned by full-timers Richard Johnson, editor and chief writer, along with Chris Wilson and Paula Froelich.
Stern, a Page Six contributor for more than a decade, allegedly tried to extort $220,000 from Ron Burkle, 53, a California supermarket billionaire, in return for “protection” from false items in the column.
Two face-to-face meetings last month between Burkle and Stern were secretly videotaped by the businessman. The matter is under investigation by the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office and the FBI.
In one exchange, Stern characterized Page Six as “a little like the Mafia, a friend of mine is a friend of yours.”
Burkle had anticipated the shakedown after Stern sent e-mails to the businessman’s aide, Kevin Marchetti. In the e-mails, Stern said he had a “strategy” for helping Burkle in Page Six’s coverage of him.
Stern, suspended from The Post immediately after inquiries by The News, has claimed in a series of published interviews from his Catskills vacation home that he was set up by Burkle.
The News and other publications have subsequently reported that Page Six staffers, including Johnson, have accepted gifts and perks from column subjects and businesses. They include Johnson’s bachelor party in Punta Mita, Mexico, hosted by “Girls Gone Wild” soft-porn king Joe Francis, and a trip he took to the Academy Awards paid for by ABC and Mercedes-Benz.
Additionally, Wilson was treated to a long-weekend junket in California’s Napa Valley last June, courtesy of Jaguar North America.
The New York Times reported yesterday that about one third of more than 30 advertisers in the February debut issue Page Six Magazine were favorably mentioned in the gossip column in the last year.
Stern was the editor of the magazine, which is scheduled to appear again in September. In an April 2 e-mail to Marchetti, Stern seemed to be inquiring about his payment and noted his influence in the next issue of the magazine.
“was everything OK w/ the wire?” Stern wrote. “… forgot to mention a story on ron was proposed for the next issue of Page 6 mag, but think we can take care of it.