Will Lewis to retire from KCRW

Lewis has been in management roles at KCRW for 32 years, coming in with Ruth Seymour at the station's inception as an NPR powerhouse. His departure follows hers by about six months. They had been together before at KPFK, Lewis as manager and Seymour as program director. It was at KPFK where Lewis famously refused to turn over a Symbionese Liberation Army tape recording to a grand jury and spent 14 days in the federal prison at Terminal Island until ordered released by Supreme Court justice William O. Douglas. Lewis' retirement from KCRW will apparently be announced tomorrow; he will remain as a media consultant to Santa Monica College. “The joy of working at KCRW,” he says, “is the way the station embraces change. It was one of the first to stream on the Internet in 1995 and became a leader in podcasting less than 10 years later.” Lewis also is president of the Los Angeles Press Club.