Alabama Newspaper Executive Resigns After Admitting He Spanked a Reporter

The former publisher of The Anniston Star in Alabama resigned Thursday as chairman of the company that owns the newspaper after admitting that he spanked a reporter in the 1970s.

The former publisher, H. Brandt Ayers, told the newspaper that it was “in the best interests of the paper and its mission” to step down from the board at its parent company, Consolidated Publishing. But his family will retain control of the company, which also owns five other publications, and his wife will take over as chairwoman of the board.

“It is of utmost importance to me that this newspaper continue to serve its role of reporting on matters of concern to the Anniston community and that nothing stand in the way of preserving the newspaper as an independently owned publication serving this community,” Ayers said in his statement to The Star. He could not be reached for comment Thursday.

His resignation came after several former reporters accused him in recent days of sexual misconduct — allegations that brought about a swift downfall for Ayers, who led The Star during the civil rights era as a rare liberal in the South. After taking over The Star from his father in the 1960s, Ayers wrote editorials denouncing bigotry and advocating school integration.

In an article published Monday, a former reporter for The Star, Veronica Pike Kennedy, told the newspaper that Ayers spanked her against her will on a Saturday in 1975 when there were few people in the building.

“I was still determined to be a reporter after that,” Kennedy, who worked at the newspaper in her 20s, told The Star. “But I hated Brandy Ayers with every cell in my body.”

In response to the accusations, Ayers, who was 40 in 1975, told the newspaper that he had made mistakes as a young journalist but did not address the specific allegations. But on Tuesday, Ayers acknowledged in an interview with The Star that he spanked another reporter, Wendy Sigal, at her home in 1973 or 1974.

Ayers claimed that Sigal had an ailment and that a doctor told him that spanking her could help. “I called the doctor and asked what should do, and he said ‘calm her down,'” Ayers told The Star.

When a reporter at the newspaper recently asked him about the accusation from Kennedy, he replied, “Let the accusation stand.”

Ayers stepped down as publisher in 2016 but stayed on as chairman of Consolidated Publishing in Anniston, a city of 22,000 about halfway between Atlanta and Birmingham, Alabama.

The current publisher, Bob Davis, said the paper was drafting a policy on sexual harassment that will outline how employees can report inappropriate behavior.