FIRST OFF . . .

ABC News President Roone Arledge denied that the network intentionally faked a photograph in the Felix Bloch spy story and lashed out at former television news executives who have criticized ABC. Arledge said the incident was the result of a “production error,� not a deliberate attempt to mislead viewers in the story about a career diplomat suspected of espionage.

The network has been widely criticized for the “World News Tonight� broadcast July 21 that used actors to simulate the handing over of a briefcase by a diplomat to a Soviet KGB agent. The ABC News chief said that the production error occurred because the producers of the show wanted to use an artist’s sketch of the handing over of a briefcase but that no artist was available at the time. Instead the producer of ABC’s “World News Tonight� took a Polaroid shot of the simulated briefcase exchange, intending to use what Arledge called a “paint-box� technique to turn the photograph into a sketch. Unknown to the people in the control room, the photograph was shown on the air.

Defending his network, Arledge said, “There’s a difference between an error or a lapse of taste or whatever and a news organization like ABC having a policy of faking things.� Arledge said the error provided “a field day, particularly for deposed ex-network news presidents who, generally speaking, have nothing to do and so they leap into print at the first opportunity without ever checking anything.� He named Fred Friendly and Richard Salant, former heads of CBS News, and Larry Grossman, former NBC News chief, and said “ABC News does not need lectures from people like that.�