Jericka Duncan (/dʒəˈriːkə/juh-REE-kuh; born August 12, 1983) is an American national TV news correspondent for CBS News in New York City. In 2018, she made headlines when she came forward with texts that Jeff Fager sent to her as she covered sexual allegations made towards him.[1]
Early life and education
Jericka Duncan was born in 1983. She attended Aurora High School, Ohio and graduated in 2001.[2] At Aurora H.S., she was on the basketball team and the track and field team. As a track & field competitor, Duncan set five records for Aurora High School. Once she graduated from high school, Duncan went on to attend Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, where she pursued a communication degree.[3] In college, Duncan continued to run track & field and was captain of the track team.[4] She received the NAACP Image Award of Athletics in 2005.[2]
Duncan graduated from Ohio University in 2005[5] with a Bachelor of Arts in Communication.[6]
In 2007, Duncan received the "Best Spot News Coverage" award from the New York State Broadcasters Association Award.[5]
In 2008, Duncan won a local "Best Morning Show" Emmy award after reporting on winter storms.[5]
In 2011 and 2012, Duncan covered the Philadelphia basement kidnapping, or the "Basement of Horror" case, where she reported on the captivity of four adults and the theft of their social security checks by their detainer.[8] This led to Duncan winning a first place award from the Associated Press and receiving a nomination for a Mid-Atlantic Emmy Award.[9]
In 2018, Jeff Fager was fired as executive producer of 60 Minutes after it was revealed that he sent Duncan threatening text messages, which Duncan exposed in September 2018.[10] Fager had been accused of sexual harassment by several women who worked for him. When Duncan was reporting the story, Fager threatened her by saying, "If you repeat these false accusations without any of your own reporting to back them up you will be responsible for hurting me. Be careful. There are people who lost their jobs trying to harm me and if you pass on these damaging claims without your own reporting to back them up that will become a serious problem."[11] After revealing the text messages, Duncan was praised by the National Association of Black Journalists for covering a portion of the Me Too movement. Fager denied the original allegations, but confessed to sending the aggressive messages to Duncan.[1]
Impact
Once Duncan announced Fager's response to her, it opened up conversations regarding repercussions of reporting for the #MeToo movement. It led to the creation of the #reportingMeToo hashtag on Twitter.[12] Also, this incident opened up a conversation about women being more likely to be assigned sexual harassment incidents and reporting messages from the accused.[13]
Reactions
In response to the moment when Fager was fired, Duncan was met with support from CBS coworkers Gayle King, Norah O'Donnell and John Dickerson.[14] She was praised for taking a stand and revealing and reading aloud the text messages sent from Fager. A short time afterward, the Buffalo Association of Black Journalists announced Duncan as a leading speaker at one of their events titled "Social Media and Reporting on Race".[7]
Jeff Glor of CBS Evening News was in the midst of covering Hurricane Florence as he said to Duncan, "You have done great work. It's difficult enough without dealing with this. That message was unacceptable. I think it's important for you to know, for everyone to know back there, that I, we, the entire team at Evening News supports you 100 percent."[15]
