You'll find Reporter Lauren Reynolds' story that breaks on 10News Sunday night at 11 p.m.an interesting account of how a rental car lot isusing outdated, broken car seats and rents them out to customers. Not a good thing. It’s a story we got tipped to by a visitor to San Diego. She has a child and was upset about the condition of the carseats she rented and how the rental lot addressed her concerns. I will say the company did pay attention after the I team got involved. Watch the story and check out what happens. Once we did get involved, the company acted responsibly and apparently is changing its policy in regards to the type and condition of car seats they rent with their vehicles. Good for them.

Here was a story where we needed hidden camera video. The seats were stored in an area of the company's sales location off of Interstate 5. We wanted to see for ourselves if the woman's claims were accurate. And we wanted to document with the camera everything we could. If we had gone in with a regular camera and requested permission to videotape their car-seat storage area, take a guess what would have happened --the same thing they told Lauren when she did show up at their offices with a regular news crew. “Sorry, corporate policy is we can’t talk to you or allow…etc.etc…etc..” Most managers in business are told to turn us away. We understand that they have to protect the people they work for. But we have a job to do, and that is to expose problems like those we found in this investigation. That's why I gave the go-ahead to producer Felicia Kit and our hidden-camera photojournalist to verify the consumer's complaints.



I also signed off on renting a car from the lot as well, renting some of the car seats so we could have the CHP look them over. The hidden camera video was important in this story to document and help us tell the story for the viewers. But trust me on this, we are very careful about how we use hidden-camera video. You will note in our story we don't videotape any customers or workers. They aren’t the issue here, the seats are.

The laws in California are pretty strict about hidden-camera video. Not so in other states. That's why network investigative teams do much more hidden camera work. They'll do it in states where the law is more liberal, like Texas. These magazine shows (Dateline, Primetime, 20/20) can get away with much more than we would even think of doing. So when you watch the latest I team story, you might want to see how we used the hidden-camera video.

It will give you an idea about one of our most valuable and misunderstood tools.

jwblog@10news.com