Shot in the Heart - Mikal Gilmore [187]
I asked Giauque if he could tell me the names of some of the journalists who were in town covering this affair. I thought that a well-connected reporter might be able to apprise me of what was going on behind the scenes in this complex situation. Most of the names he mentioned— journalists like Geraldo Rivera—were people I had no interest in talking to. Then he mentioned Bill Movers, the former press aide to President Lyndon B. Johnson, and a writer and journalist I had much respect for.
“Can you put me together with Movers?” I asked.
A couple of hours later I was having dinner and a much-needed drink or two with Movers at his hotel. He clearly had some misgivings about the moral dimensions of covering this story, and he was not glad to see the death penalty returning to America. He agreed to talk with me and tell me what he knew, and he assured me that he would never use any of the information I gave him in his reporting unless he cleared it with me. He told me that I should be cautious about the advice that any legal, business, or journalistic people might give me in the days ahead—that instead, I should try to come to terms with my own conscience and try to reconcile that with the communications that would go on between me and Gary. Even now, all these years later, I remain certain that Bill Moyers’s gentle concern was a key influence in helping me hold on to my sanity during that week.
AT NINE O’CLOCK THAT NIGHT I CALLED VERNON to ask if any arrangements had been made for a meeting with Moody and Stanger. The lawyers were unavailable at the time, but Schiller was flying in from Los Angeles and was willing to meet me at the Salt Lake Hilton at one in the morning. I was a little drunk and in need of sleep, but I didn’t want to pass up a meeting with Gary’s keeper.
At the Hilton, I recognized Schiller from his picture in the December 20th New West article, “The Merchandising of Gary Gilmore,” by Barry Farrell (who later became one of Schiller’s researchers and collaborators); he recognized me because of my resemblance to Gary. I had wanted to meet Schiller—who had something of a reputation as a death-minded entrepreneur for his interviews for Albert Goldman’s infamous Lenny Bruce biography, and for his handling of projects and stories involving Marilyn Monroe, Jack Ruby, and Sharon Tate murderer Susan Atkins— because it occurred to me that he might be trying to exploit this execution for his own ends. Also, I realized that to deal with Gary at this stage, I would also have to deal with the man who owned Gary’s story.
Schiller and I talked for nearly two hours. Each of us asked pointed questions about what we were doing in Utah and about our interests in Gary. I spoke frankly of my concerns about Gary’s choices and their possible ramifications, and Schiller responded sympathetically to those concerns, but stopped short of professing to share them. Finally I asked Schiller what I considered an inescapable question: Was Gary worth more to him dead than alive?
Schiller hesitated for a few moments, then said: “Many years ago, when I was working as a news photographer, I was sent out to cover a fire. There were firemen carrying a person through a window, and I had to ask myself whether I should take a picture of that moment, or put down my camera and go help them drag that person to safety. I chose to take the picture. I decided then it was my obligation as a journalist to preserve what existed.
“To answer your question, I’m here to record history, not to make it.”
At the end of the session, Schiller had impressed me with his forth-rightness.