David Westin
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Biography
Although he admittedly does not have a resume full of so-called journalism credentials per se, David Westin became the heir apparent to Roone Arledge as undisputed head of ABC News in March of 1997 when he was named president of the network's news division. While Westin continued to report to Arledge, who was named chair of the division, Arledge said the appointment made Westin "my partner" in running ABC News.
Westin's road to the news division was not a classic one. A graduate of both the University of Michigan and its Law School, he served as law clerk to US Supreme Court associate justice Lewis F. Powell in 1978. Westin became an associate and later a partner in the law firm of Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering, working in the firm's London office from 1982-83. He has also taught law at both Harvard and Georgetown, concentrating on international civil legislation. (Westin co-authored "International Civil Litigation in U.S. Courts and International Law Treatise".) This background made him a surprise choice when he joined Capital Cities/ABC as vice president and general counsel in 1991, although it was assumed to signal the company's desire to expand outside the USA. Yet, Westin quickly moved through the company in another direction when he was named president of production in the ABC Television Network Group in August 1993. Concurrently, he was named senior vice president of the parent company, CapCities/ABC. In this role, he supervised the company's programming ventures and co- productions as well as domestic syndication activities. A year later, Westin was named president, ABC Television Network Group, with responsibilities for all divisions and program units, including ABC News, ABC Sports (both of which were under Arledge's aegis), ABC Entertainment, and the sales, affiliate, operations, and communications ends. Westin was not comfortable with the entertainment division, but won loyalties within the company for his support of ABC News during its court battles with the Food Lion chain, which claimed ABC's "PrimeTime Live" had used false pretenses in a report on alleged unsanitary conditions at the chain's stores. Westin even appeared on the program-- something rare for an executive--to defend ABC News' practices.
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