Crisis Management

David Kelly, the scientist whose suicide marked a tragic twist in the unfolding controversy over British intelligence dossiers that supported the war in Iraq, was "ripped apart in the middle" of a "war of spin," said an editor at the British Broadcasting Corporation. The BBC has come under intense criticism for its reports alleging that top British officials "sexed up" the dossiers, and now it is being criticized on grounds that its reports may have contributed to Kelly's suicide. "Yes, we had a role in it," the editor said.

Image consultants are praising Martha Stewart's bid to get public opinion on her side and to influence potential jurors, reports the Associated Press. The campaign includes a national newspaper advertisement and a new website, marthatalks.com, that went up the day Stewart was indicted in federal court for securities fraud and lying to authorities.

Fearing the Indian Point nuclear plant is an appealing target for terrorists, neighbors, activists and local officials are demanding that parent company Entergy shut down the facility, which is located 35 miles upstream from New York City. The New Orleans-based energy company, which owns nine other nuclear power plants, hired former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani's PR firm to help out with security and crisis management issues. O'Dwyer's PR Daily reports that Entergy enlisted Giuliani Partners for its "real-world public safety experience" earned following the Sept.

"France's Sodexho Alliance is fending off Congressional bids to strip it of its $880 million food service contract with the U.S. Marines because of the French snub of President Bush's invasion of Iraq," O'Dwyer's PR Daily reports. "Edelman is our corporate agency of record, and we use it for crisis work," Bonnie Goldstein, a PR staffer at Sodexho's North American headquarters in Gaithersburg, Md., told O'Dwyer's. "Rep. Jack Kingman (R-Ga.) wrote a letter to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld asking him to consider transferring the Marines contract to a U.S.-based firm.