LITTLE ROCK — While taping KATV’s 7 on Your Side, Dewayne Graham would do anything to uncover the truth and protect the consumer.
“This guy, he was trying to talk to had crawled under a trailer, and Dewayne crawled under there to talk to him,” said KATV, Channel 7 producer Shann Nobles. “He was a bulldog. He would not take no for an answer.”
Graham, of Sherwood, died Wednesday at St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center in Little Rock from various health complications, said his wife, Sandra Graham. He was 63.
In 1989, Graham was hired as an investigative reporter to expose corrupt products, businesses and people in two-minute segments for KATV.
“There was a blow-up boat, that was the very first story he did,” his wife said. “He got the boat, had it blown up, and the thing started to sink when he was out [on the water], and of course he got it all on camera.”
Soon, a group of volunteers were at the KATV office taking calls about injustices that he could report.
“He dealt with slumlords, people with car dealerships that were not reputable,” Nobles said. “He also would do stuff like tax issues and what you needed to know coming up.”
Graham never gave up helping the little man, no matter the risk, Sandra Graham said.
“He’d take the cameraman and camera, and it was an in-your-face kind of thing,” his wife said. “He had a lot of death threats. ... His name was feared, people would use it, ‘I’m going to call 7 on Your Side,’ and it got results.”
However, Graham went to great lengths to protect his family and once, their vehicles, after an angry wrecker service owner was featured on the show.
“One night, Dewayne parked the cars sideways in the driveway ... because the guy was threatening to take Dewayne’s cars,” his wife said.
True to his character, Dewayne didn’t give up on his marriage or political career, even though there were bumps along the way.
“[One night] we sat on the bank of the Mississippi River and talked all night,” Sandra Graham said, adding they married in 1987. “We were best friends.”
They divorced seven years later, but when she stopped by once to get a copy of the divorce papers, Sandra Graham said she “didn’t leave again.”
“We were just like peas and carrots,” she said. They remarried in 2001.
In 2000, Graham left journalism to run for U.S. Congress against Mike Ross.
After losing, Graham ran another unsuccessful campaign in 2006 for Pulaski County sheriff.
“He said that was the stupidest thing he did,” his wife said. “That’s how bad he wanted to help. He saw problems with the law, and he thought he could get in there and help.”
In recent years, Graham worked as program director for KMTL-AM 760, a religious radio station. Graham struggled with several health issues, including a bleeding ulcer, but continued to do the things he enjoyed.
“We loved to fish, but we spent more time getting our hooks out of the trees than in the water,” Sandra Graham laughed.
Often described as a bulldog, it was ironic that Graham’s closest companion was a 2-pound Yorkie named Prissy Prancer.
“He’d say [to the dog] ‘Let’s go to bed,’” his wife said. “She’d crawl under the covers, put her little head in the bend of his arm, and that’s where she’d sleep.”
Arkansas, Pages 10 on 12/01/2012