Clout: Seriously, what about those vacation pics?

October 03, 2008

THE BIGGEST story in Philly yesterday wasn't the vice-presidential debate, but the eyebrow-raising beach-vacation photos depicting City Council aide Latrice Bryant and her boss, Councilman W. Wilson Goode Jr.

The photos, displayed in a Fox 29 news report and on its Web site, were the latest volley in the war between Bryant and the TV station.

Bryant became the talk of the city after she brandished crudely lettered signs at a Council session saying "Fox 29 are racist" and "Jeff Cole KKK." Bryant, who later apologized to Goode, was steamed because Fox 29 reporter Jeff Cole, known for his "gotcha" reporting, had been following Bryant.

Fox footage caught Bryant visiting Goode's home and attending to personal business when she was supposed to have been at work.

Daily News columnist Jenice Armstrong has been trying to get Bryant to tell her side of the story, but the beach photos knocked that out.

"Right now, she is quite upset that she has been portrayed in one light, and that light is unflattering and biased and unreasonable," Bryant's attorney, Michael Coard, told Armstrong.

"She has been doing her work," Coard said. "She's still doing her job. But she certainly feels she has been attacked unfairly for the benefit of local TV ratings."

Goode has said that he's already cleaned up what was sloppy timekeeping.

Yeah, but what about those vacation photos? In some of the photos, Bryant and Goode are embracing. In others, he has his arms wrapped around Bryant's shapely, bikini-clad body. The councilman has denied having a romantic involvement with his $90,000-a-year aide.

"If anybody asks me if they had a relationship, my initial response would be it's none of my damn business," Coard said. "I never asked Latrice that question, and I would never ask that question . . . it's so irrelevant."

Yeah, but about those photos?

"In viewing these photos, reasonable people will come to a conclusion based on what they see," he said.

"They're not kissing. They're not having sex. We don't know what

they're talking about," Coard said. "We only see a snapshot."

Hey, maybe they just cuddle.

As for the issue of Bryant's time sheet, Coard said that it has all been overblown.

"This is not the crime of the century," he said. "Some journalists report the news. And others make it."

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