Bob Greene Gets Spiked

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The fact is that being Bob Greene is different from being most people. Greene's franchise was his benign appropriateness, from his defense of abused children to his adoration of Michael Jordan. His colleagues knew that a more complex reality lurked nearby. "Anybody who was close to Bob was saddened by the news," says deputy managing editor James Warren, "but not necessarily surprised." So far, four other women have publicly claimed that they had a sexual encounter with Greene, who has been married for 31 years. Says Neil Steinberg, a rival columnist at the Chicago Sun-Times who has spent his career mocking Greene: "The defender of the purity of America [has] been using the newspaper as chick bait for 25 years."

The woman is not talking, and neither is Greene--aside from a short, contrite e-mail he sent to the A.P., saying "I don't have the words to express the sadness I feel." But there's a decent chance the prolific Greene may find a way to capture an audience again. "Bob's one of the most commercially astute journalists I know," says Warren. "There will be a book and an Oprah appearance a year down the road." --Reported by Marguerite Michaels and Maggie Sieger/Chicago