NY Daily News Editors Out After Sexual Harassment Accusations

NEW YORK, NY — Two top editors at the New York Daily News who were accused of sexual harassment have left the paper, its parent company said Thursday. Robert Moore and Alexander "Doc" Jones are "no longer with the company," said Marisa Kollias, a spokeswoman for tronc which bought the Daily News in September.

Kollias did not answer questions about whether the editors were fired or resigned. She also did not give specific reasons for their departures.

Moore, formerly the Daily News' managing editor, was accused of making sexual advances on staffers and threatening them to discourage them from reporting him, according to a Huffington Post story detailing the allegations.

Moore started with the Daily News in 2004. He was briefly the top editor in the newsroom after editor-in-chief Arthur Brown resigned in December.

Jones, the now-former managing editor of the Sunday desk who had worked at the paper since at least 2000, showed a "pattern" of inappropriate behavior that included forcibly kissing fellow employees, the Huffington Post reported last week. He was escorted out of the paper's Lower Manhattan headquarters last Thursday, the website reported.

Tronc had reportedly been investigating both editors for workplace harassment. The company also owns the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribue and other papers around the U.S.

Their exits are the latest big changes at the upper echelons of one of New York City's tabloid newspapers. Jim Rich was reportedly picked this week to return to the Daily News as editor-in-chief after tronc executive Jim Kirk's brief stint at the helm.

Their departures also continue the media industry's reckoning with sexual harassment and assault among its most powerful figures. Los Angeles Times publisher Ross Levinsohn, another top tronc executive, is reportedly facing an internal investigation after NPR reported this month that he was sued for sexual harassment in past jobs.

(Lead image: The New York Daily News headquarters stands in Lower Manhattan in September. Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)