While reading the breaking news crime story, I became very involved with the words and how the incident was described. I think this is because of how close to home to event was and especially close to school. As per Dr. Jerz's question, I am not sure how much more depth the author could have because of how much detail was already evident. The length and detail were the most pleasing to me because of how quick I could read the information and find out what was going on.
I thought it was really smart of the Trib to say "The Tribune-Review does not name alleged victims of sexual assault" (Paterra). Not only did the article not give the names of the victim, but they said they were not going to do it. I like reading articles and being able to refer back to the information that we discussed in class. There is much more length and detail in this article compared to the first on. Once again, the first article was a Breaking News article and the second article was pretty much a follow-up.
As for the actual news in the second article, I believe it is full of news or is it just facts? I would think that the information is mostly facts since the event was already breaking news a month ago.
Click here for the course web page devoted to the crime report.
See, I felt the opposite way you did about the line, "The Tribune-Review does not name alleged victims of sexual assault.” They left it in its own paragraph even to draw extra attention to it. The fact of the matter is that, whether they make a habit of releasing the names of “alleged victims of sexual assault” or not, in this case they couldn’t because the girl is 17. This means she is a minor and it’s illegal for them to print her name anyway. I felt almost like the journalist was patting himself on the back for the sensitivity of the newspaper.
Also in the second article, I could help but wonder if there wasn’t some better way to say what the defendants were charged with besides listing each of their names with a long list of everything they were charge with. Here is one such example from the article: “Jonathan Pollard was charged with rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, sexual assault, unlawful restraint, false imprisonment, interference with the custody of children, aggravated assault, simple assault, corruption of minors, terroristic threats, recklessly endangering another person and criminal conspiracy.” I mean, is it really necessary to list all these things, if there is nothing else to say about any of them? It seems like a waste of space to me. Nor is it particularly interesting for the reader to read this huge list. This could have been summarized easily by saying something like, “Jonathan Pollard faced 13 separate charges.”
Derek, good point about the second article. I'm not sure that it was news, persay. More like facts. And, as Greta said, rather detailed facts. Though, I'm not sure there was a way to get around it. If the writer had said that Pollard was faced with 13 separate charges, the reader would probably wonder what they were. I agree, though, Greta, it wasn't that interesting.
About the first article, I thought I felt left out because there wasn't so much detail. I don't live around here so I wasn't familiar with any of the places. I would have needed more description or quotes to really make it realistic for me.
Great comments all! Greta - I really like how you broke down the information and described in a specific way. You're right about the girl's name and her age of 17. She is a minor so only specific information can be released or someone can get into trouble.
News or facts? A question that each classmate can describe differently!