CBS 3 recycles a sweeps story from New York Tuesday night

CBS 3 did something quite lazy for last night’s sweeps story – borrowing it from what they said was their “New York sister station WCBS.” The story in question, which originally aired on November 20th, was an interview with Golan Cipel, the man who’s accusations of sexual harassment brought down New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey. Our sister-ist Gothamist even noted it the next day, writing, “Monday night at 11 p.m. WCBS finally aired what they have been touting as a world exclusive interview with Golan Cipel.”

Looking at the original WCBS interview, it is apparent that CBS 3 just added some of their own graphics over their sister station’s graphics and had their station’s anchor Jim Rosenfield record a piece at the end saying he was reporting “for CBS 3.”

The interview itself had Rosenfield and Cipel visiting McGreevey's former condo in Woodbridge where it is alleged the sexual harassment occurred. The report also featured a rundown of the various incidents, and a sit-down interview in which Cipel denied he was gay.

According to WCBS, the story was two parts, and CBS 3 made no mention of the second part airing. So it looks like we may be getting short-changed a bit here; either that, or we got some sort of condensed story and interview. Still, it seems a bit lazy on the part of CBS 3 to rely on the work of their sister station to try to get ratings.