In the aftermath of the spa shooting in Wisconsin on Sunday, WTMJ anchor Susan Kim reported on her personal connection to one of the victims: Kim was a client of Zina Haughton, a stylist at the spa who was the estranged wife of the alleged shooter. Seven people were shot before the gunman killed himself.

Kim first revealed the news from the scene around 2:30 p.m., saying, “My stylist may be related to … the alleged gunman. She’s a really wonderful person.” Haughton was one of the three fatalities in the shooting.

Kim remained on the scene throughout WTMJ’s continuing coverage, offering detailed accounts of the spa and Haughton:

I did know the gunman’s wife. She was my stylist. She was just a dear, darling woman. She’s in her early 40s, and she talked about her two girls. She was a very proud mother, very happy, an excellent stylist, really took her job seriously. You could tell that she was very well-liked within the spa.

Kim went on to say that she had talked to the woman’s other clients, who reported that she was “frustrated and tired about her marriage and that she was finally going to do it, to file for divorce.”

In a blog post on the WTMJ website, anchor Shelly Wolcott wrote about Kim’s personal connection to the story: Read more

Twitter was an easy target for April Fool’s hijinks this morning as a couple of media writers floated fake stories that centered on local newsers’ obsession with the 140-character medium.

NewscastStudio posted a story about a Pennsylvania station’s announcement that it was ditching traditional newscasts for Twitter, while OnMilwaukee reported that WTMJ morning anchor Susan Kim tweeted the station’s entire 2-hour newscast this morning.

NewscastStudio wrote that the unnamed PA station would now distribute news via the @PennaNews Twitter handle, sending “a rapid-fire series of tweets during the times the station currently broadcasts news, such as 6 to 6:30 p.m.” Eliminating all on-air positions, the station would rely on “twanchors” instead.

OnMilwaukee observed that, while Kim’s Twitter followers enjoyed a rapid succession of tweets, TV “viewers may have been baffled by the sight of the veteran anchor sitting at the desk, head down, as her fingers moved furiously — and quite adeptly — across the keypad of her smartphone.” Read more