FTVLive was the FIRST to tell you that WCCB (Charlotte) Anchor Terrance Bates was arrested for "assaulting a female (his wife)."

Bates’s wife – Tamara Bates, 44 – alleges that he choked her and threw her to the ground last Tuesday morning.

The station made no mention of his arrest, but the Charlotte Observer has finally gotten around to covering the news. And so did WBTV. Both were waaaaaay behind FTVLive. 

The paper reports that since Bates’s arrest, the station has had Amy Cowman sitting in the news anchor chair throughout the weekday morning broadcasts, which run from 4:30 to 9 a.m. WCCB general manager Jim White said Terrance Bates is “very much still employed” and has been working in the office since his arrest, adding that Bates will return to the air “when the time is right.”

“We’re trying to understand everything,” White said. “We’re trying to let things play out to whatever the resolution is going to be, and then make a decision based off of that.”

His trial has been scheduled for May 2.

Hey!!! Just in time for sweeps.