Police Reporting: It's A 'Crime'

Last century covering the public safety beat was hands on journalism. Hands on a pencil and a wad of blank newsprint. Hands on the steering wheel racing to the scene. Hands on the clipboard with carbon copies of all the day's police reports. Hands on the knobs of police radios. Hands on your home phone when it rings at 2 a.m. with a tip. And hands on the ground when you and the police around you all try to dive under the same squad car to avoid sudden gunfire.

Two auto salesmen captured a heavily armed juvenile rape and kidnapping suspect after chasing him down Scottsdale Road in their high-powered demonstrator late yesterday. Copyright (c) John Polich, April 4, 1965.

This century the "crime" often seems to be the reporting

This century the "crime" often seems to be the reporting, not the armed robbery or shooting. It is as if there is a check list on the wall of all newsrooms:

1. Wait for an official government Tweet.
2. Re-Tweet the official government Tweet.
3. Repeat.
4. Wait for the image from the "news" helicopter.
5. Wait behind the crime scene tape.

Behind the tape? This century too often the first question from journalists is "Where is the media staging area," not "What, who, when, where, why?" Last century the concept of a holding pen for reporters and photographers hardly existed, even for the visit of a President, as my arms-length photograph illustrates:

LBJ at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport, Oct 11, 1964 Copyright (c) John Polich

A pen was something journalists wrote with, not a cage to contain them. I am reminded of this every day by incidents ignored by most local media, except for a belated rehash of a government Tweet.

One recent afternoon medics were dispatched to a traffic collision, a routine call that in itself was not news. What was news was the report from the first unit on the scene: send five helicopters for immediate evacuation of the critically injured; two other occupants of the vehicles were already dead.

Although this alarm went out from the Regional Dispatch Center on in-the-clear radio frequencies, there was no significant media follow up. Instead, here was the important highway news that very same evening:

'Transformers' movie closes Loop 303 for filming. Autobots and Decepticons are transforming the way Valley drivers will travel for the next few days.

This hole in daily journalism is important for three reasons.

First, traffic collisions are not accidents

The first reason this story is important to everyone is that traffic collisions are not "accidents" and should be widely reported in the hope that it will encourage people to drive more alertly and defensively. This brings to mind another recent headline:

ADOT: 2015 was deadliest on Arizona roads in 7 years

Second, the sum of little events is often the big story

The second reason this story is important is that the sum of isolated events is often the bigger news. In this case, it is a reminder that despite seat belts and later safety improvements, drivers still kill or are killed on the road, often by inattention and impairment behind the wheel. That is something citizens can address through their own behavior and through pressure on government for better education, enforcement, prosecution, car design and highway engineering.

Third, it's not just the police beat we should worry about

The third reason this story is important is that the media's inattention to the police beat should make us wonder what other beats-- the legislature, education, real estate, you name it-- reply on the good faith of official Tweeters rather than original reporting. 

One thing that's not news: Many leaders in every field prefer to "put their best foot forward" in a Tweet rather than answer a journalist's objective questions face-to-face.