Same Enquirer "reporter" on Edwards "case" played the same love-child card with Ted Kennedy in 2006.

[VOX]

You'd think this "reporter," Alan Butterfield, would have worked up a new schtick by now. but nothing succeed like excess, especially with such an exponent of esteemed journalism like the National Enquirer.

Unfortunately, I can't link to the stories, since I located these in Lexis Nexis and Factiva -- but if anyone has those resources available, just search "Alan Butterfield," and "Enquirer," and you'll be kneecap-deep in sleaze in mere moments.

I've included a couple of Butterfield's earlier Pulitzer-worthy :sarcasm: efforts below.


The Boston Globe
November 29, 2007
A Cape Cod woman is suing the National Enquirer, claiming that two stories it published about a supposed "love child" with Senator Ted Kennedy. In the suit...Caroline Bilodeau-Allen of East Sandwich says that "virtually every critical fact which (the Enquirer) reported is false and defamatory."
<snip>
Bilodeau-Allen's son Christopher, now a 22-year-old college student, is also a plaintiff in the suit, which names the Enquirer's corporate parent American Media and two of its reporters, Alan Butterfield and Richard Moriarty.
<snip>

- - - - - - -

Cape woman sues tab over Ted K story
Boston Herald
29 November 2007
By GAYLE FEE AND LAURA RAPOSA WITH ERIN HAYES
1023 words

An East Sandwich woman and her son are suing The National Enquirer saying
the supermarket tabloid printed "outright fabrications" alleging that she
gave birth to Sen. Ted Kennedy's "love child" then participated in a
"20-year coverup" of the scandal.

"Virtually every critical fact which these stories reported is false and
each is defamatory," says the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Boston
by Caroline Bilodeau-Allen and her son, Christopher.

The lawsuit contends that Christopher is not Kennedy's biological son, that
there is "no paternity test which proves that Sen. Kennedy fathered Mrs.
Bilodeau-Allen's son." That "Sen. Kennedy never `paid' Mrs. Bilodeau-Allen
to cover up a scandal, nor did Mrs. Bilodeau- Allen participate in any
conspiracy to have the `scandal' `covered up.' "

But yesterday the Enquirer stood by the story.

"We intend to vigorously defend the lawsuit and have every confidence that
we will prevail at trial," a spokesman for the tabloid told the Track.

<snip>

The lawsuit also names reporters Alan Butterfield and Richard Moriarty.
Butterfield is still with the Enquirer, Moriarty...is not.

- - - - -

Paper Fires Reporters Who Sold Smart Case Info To Tabloid
Dow Jones International News
29 April 2003
873 words
The Salt Lake Tribune said Tuesday that it fired two reporters who were paid
$20,000 for collaborating with the National Enquirer on an Elizabeth Smart
story because they misled their employer about the level of their
involvement with the tabloid.

Michael Vigh and Kevin Cantera were fired less than a week after Tribune
editor James E. Shelledy refused their resignations.

<snip>

Vigh and Cantera, the lead reporters on the Smart kidnapping case, didn't
tell Shelledy of their dealings with the Enquirer until last week, when they
offered to resign. He refused their resignations, but put them on a year's
probation and forbade them from doing any freelance work. The two also were
pulled off coverage of the Smart case.

The tabloid article was published about a month after Elizabeth, now 15, was
abducted at knifepoint from her bedroom...

<snip>

On Monday, the Enquirer sent a letter to the Tribune demanding a retraction
for the column, saying Shelledy misrepresented how the tabloid got the story
and wrongly implied the Tribune reporters had merely provided
unsubstantiated rumors.

<snip>

Alan Butterfield, the Enquirer reporter who brokered the deal with the Vigh
and Cantera, played The Associated Press two very brief portions of a
telephone conversation with Cantera taped without the reporter's knowledge
the day after the three agreed to work together.

In one of the snippets, Butterfield is heard asking Cantera to make sure the
Tribune didn't scoop the Enquirer on the Smart details. Cantera responded by
saying he would push for the Tribune to publish the story, but that the
newspaper probably would reject it. "My editors are a different story.
They're real lightweights sometimes," he said.

In the other taped snippet, Butterfield asked, "Everything you told me last
night, you're solid on?"

"Oh yeah," Cantera answered.

<snip>
- - - - - -
The Washington Times
August 18, 2003

An unlikely ally for Jennifer Lopez's in-the-doghouse husband-to-be: a
stripper.

Antonella Santini, better known to the patrons of a Canadian exotic-dance
nightery as Felicia, has filed a libel and slander suit against the National
Enquirer, charging that, contrary to the tab's headline-making reports, she
did not get "Gigli" with Ben Affleck at the club last month.

The Enquirer and its reporters "acted reprehensibly and must be punished
before they callously destroy another private person's life in their race to
profit and sell tabloid magazines," Miss Santini's lawsuit says.
Named in the complaint, filed last week in Los Angeles, are American Media
Inc., the Enquirer's parent company, and journalists Alan Butterfield, Rick
Egusquiza and Neil Blincow.
<snip>