BBC employee criticised after PRs hand deliver Mormon documentary complaint

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/mar/27/bbc-mormon-prs-complaint

Version 0 of 1.

A BBC employee has been criticised by colleagues for allegedly allowing two PRs representing the Mormon church into one of the corporation's buildings in west London to hand deliver a letter of complaint.

The member of staff is understood to have allowed two representatives from the PR and lobbying firm APCO Worldwide, which represents the Mormon church into the BBC Media Centre at White City. One of the PRs was said to be James Acheson-Gray, APCO's managing director.

They approached Lucy Hetherington, the series editor of the BBC2 This World current affairs documentary strand, and took the unusual step of delivered a letter in person complaining about The Mormon Candidate, made by reporter John Sweeney, which is to be broadcast on Tuesday evening.

Sweeney's hour-long documentary is understood to make a series of claims about the Mormons, including suggestions that some members of the church have been brainwashed.

He interviewed a number of ex-Mormons who claim the church is a cult. One of the people interviewed is the cousin of US presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, Park Romney, who says the church engages in "brainwashing".

The letter complained about an interview which Sweeney conducted with Mormon apostle Elder Jeffrey Holland, which the church claims was "an ambush" according to a BBC source.

Sweeney, who once had a very public spat with the Church of Scientology over two Panorama programmes he has made , disputes these claims, insisting that Elder Holland was fully briefed about who he was and what he wanted to talk about.

Sweeney, who was out of the country when the incident occurred, told MediaGuardian: "I was flabbergasted that the PR operation for the Mormon church found it necessary to invade our office. Even Scientology didn't invade the offices of the BBC and people say they can walk through walls."

A BBC insider said many within the corporation were furious that the PRs were granted access.

The BBC issued a statement which said: "A person turned up unexpectedly and hand delivered a letter to which we later responded. There was no breach of security."

APCO Worldwide had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication.

• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".

• To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook.