Another One of Those No-Brainer Cases
This sort of thing should be relatively cut and dry. It shouldn't really be newsworthy, but there it sits in the Duluth News.
Charges will not be filed against a 45-year-old man who shot an intruder who fell into his Janesville home through the living room ceiling last week, the Rock County district attorney says.
Hmm...charges won't be filed against a man defending his home from some lowlife scumbag trying to break into his home to do God knows what. I'm thinking a good pat on the back, an "Atta' boy" and a good "Criminals don't try this at someone else's home" spot on "The More You Know" series might be in order. Of course, you could make your argument, "Well, they had to investigate, I mean, we don't know what really happened!" And you'd be right. Anything like that should and does get investigated. But that's not the real point now is it?
The point is a man shot an intruder and the main focus of the local news story discussing it is whether he should be tried. Amazingly, no one seems to agree that he should be, at least not of the quoted sources.
(DA) O'Leary said he would never be able to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that the homeowner was unreasonable in believing that he and his family were in danger.
Wisconsin law did not require the homeowner to retreat, O'Leary said.
Not exactly couched authoritatively is it? Well, this guy says it's not required, we're not going to look up Wisconsin law or anything, just letting you know it's all about this guy and what he's saying, so you can disagree if you want to. Do ya Chesta? Huh? Yah wanna disagree or somethin!!" like the yippy little dog this article is.
Perhaps I'm being a bit overreaching in my analysis, but a more unbiased approach might not have focused so much on the cons being disproven rather than the pros being stated. This story exhibits a sort of passive bias. It doesn't come right out in your face and say that the author thinks what he did was "cave manesque" or "criminal", but it does hope to make you think twice before even entertaining the thought of doing the same. It's worth pointing such things out. Now, I'm sure I'll get arguments that these are just my point of view or my interpretation and that's correct, but it's quite the educated little opinion I'm fielding here and it's that this story could have been written better.
This sort of thing should be relatively cut and dry. It shouldn't really be newsworthy, but there it sits in the Duluth News.
Charges will not be filed against a 45-year-old man who shot an intruder who fell into his Janesville home through the living room ceiling last week, the Rock County district attorney says.
Hmm...charges won't be filed against a man defending his home from some lowlife scumbag trying to break into his home to do God knows what. I'm thinking a good pat on the back, an "Atta' boy" and a good "Criminals don't try this at someone else's home" spot on "The More You Know" series might be in order. Of course, you could make your argument, "Well, they had to investigate, I mean, we don't know what really happened!" And you'd be right. Anything like that should and does get investigated. But that's not the real point now is it?
The point is a man shot an intruder and the main focus of the local news story discussing it is whether he should be tried. Amazingly, no one seems to agree that he should be, at least not of the quoted sources.
(DA) O'Leary said he would never be able to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that the homeowner was unreasonable in believing that he and his family were in danger.
Wisconsin law did not require the homeowner to retreat, O'Leary said.
Not exactly couched authoritatively is it? Well, this guy says it's not required, we're not going to look up Wisconsin law or anything, just letting you know it's all about this guy and what he's saying, so you can disagree if you want to. Do ya Chesta? Huh? Yah wanna disagree or somethin!!" like the yippy little dog this article is.
Perhaps I'm being a bit overreaching in my analysis, but a more unbiased approach might not have focused so much on the cons being disproven rather than the pros being stated. This story exhibits a sort of passive bias. It doesn't come right out in your face and say that the author thinks what he did was "cave manesque" or "criminal", but it does hope to make you think twice before even entertaining the thought of doing the same. It's worth pointing such things out. Now, I'm sure I'll get arguments that these are just my point of view or my interpretation and that's correct, but it's quite the educated little opinion I'm fielding here and it's that this story could have been written better.
posted by Rob Beck | 12:34 AM
1 Comments:
I can't find the press release online, but I get the impression that the article was simply a paraphrase of the District Attorney's statement. Cookie-cutter journalism, no research, no depth. Lazy.
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