Incident details
- Date of incident
- June 29, 2026
- Assailant
- Private individual
- Was the journalist targeted?
- Yes
Assault
- Equipment damaged
- Actor
- Private individual
Equipment Damage
A WBBM-TV station van after it was damaged by a group of men who targeted the station’s reporter and photographer on June 29, 2026, in Chicago, Illinois.
A WBBM-TV reporter was preparing for a live broadcast with a photographer in Chicago, Illinois, on June 29, 2026, when the journalists were targeted by a group of men who shouted racial slurs and damaged the station’s news vehicle.
The reporter and photographer were near a local planetarium when several men in a white tow truck approached them, the CBS-owned outlet reported. One of the men yelled racial slurs and directed his unleashed German shepherd dog to attack the photographer, who is a Black man.
When the dog did not attack, one man smashed the news vehicle’s windshield with a traffic cone while another damaged the photographer’s camera, the station said.
About 20 minutes later, police responded to a separate incident involving the same tow truck and arrested three suspects. They recovered a firearm during the investigation.
In a later newscast, reporter Jermont Terry said the journalists, who were not identified, were safe. “While they are not physically hurt, what they endured while simply gathering news will impact them for quite some time.”
WBBM-TV reported that the suspects, who have not been identified, may face hate crime charges.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker catalogs press freedom violations in the United States. Email tips to [email protected].
