WHAT'S MISSING FROM THE DAILY NEWS
March 8, 2007
Michael Smerconish
HAS THE Daily News
gone PC on an issue that could cause people to get hurt? Watching the crime
blotter, I fear it's the case. The newspaper I love appears to be omitting
pertinent descriptive details of perpetrators that could help catch the bad
guys. Deliberate? You decide.
I saw this item on Tuesday:
A bearded, middle-aged man is being sought for the
robbery yesterday of a PNC Bank in Stratford, N.J.
The robber, described as 40 to 50 years old, handed a
teller a demand note about 10 a.m. and fled with an undisclosed amount of cash,
authorities said.
He was wearing a dark coat, black knit hat and blue
jeans.
Bearded, middle-aged? We get the color of his hat and jeans,
but not his skin? Maybe it was an oversight, but reviewing the archives, I saw
this from Feb. 28:
A middle-aged robber with a distinctive long white beard
is being sought for the robbery Monday of the First Trust Bank, 1931 Cottman
Ave., in the Northeast.
The FBI said the thief, described as 50 to 60 years old
and wearing several layers of dark clothing with a green hood, handed a teller
a demand note and fled with an undisclosed amount of cash.
On Feb. 23, this ran:
Cops focus on 'splash-and-grab' thieves
... The offenders have been described as men in their
early 20s who have thin to medium builds and who were wearing dark clothes.
Men in their early 20s? That really narrows the pool. Two
days earlier, Feb. 21, it was this:
A bespectacled man allegedly robbed and attempted to rape
a woman in a Northern Liberties dry cleaners yesterday morning.
Police said the man, described as 5 feet 10 and 180
pounds, threatened the 56-year-old woman with a simulated weapon inside Liberty
Walk Dry Cleaners, on American Street near Wildey, shortly before 10 a.m. The
woman handed over $100.
Bespectacled? Even when it's a rapist, only height and
weight?
In a highly publicized case, I found at least one article
that was vague as to the perpetrators. On Feb. 22, the headline read: "Beaten,
dying, she calls attacker 'a coward for what he did to me.' " The story concerned the murder of 82-year-old Julia
Kay.
The DN reported that she died from blunt-force trauma to the
head, face and chest. Her injuries included a broken eye socket, breastbone,
cheekbone, nose and a few ribs, and a fractured skull.
No wonder the neighbors who were interviewed for the story
requested and received a cloak of anonymity. Such was their level of concern
for safety that they asked the DN for pseudonyms.
Still, the only description was this: "The suspect wore
a black knit cap, a black jacket with white patches and black pants and boots,
police said."
The next day, DN coverage offered his race, approximate age
and size, presumably because he'd been videotaped at a nearby Rite-Aid, so the
info was now out.
I turned to Daily News
Editor Michael Days for a response:
"You're barking up the wrong tree," he said.
"We routinely run security-camera frame grabs or official police sketches
of those wanted in our reading area. We also strive to gather as many
descriptors as possible about the culprits. That's generally more helpful than
saying, for example, that cops are looking for a bald-headed white man. That's
so generic, people might wonder if it were you.
'IN FACT, the FBI and others credit us with helping them
catch fugitives because of our weekly Most Wanted photo. We led with a piece
just this Saturday that featured a video grab of bandits on the run. And one of
the pieces that you mentioned, the splash and grab, definitely had a video
frame that accompanied the piece.
"If you're suggesting that we're trying to hide the
facts, then let me by quite clear: It just ain't so."
This issue harkens back to a dark day for this paper.
Remember the Aug. 22, 2002, front-page headline "Fugitives among
us," splashed across the photos of 18
perps, all minorities?
But that's not the dark day I'm referring to. No, the
low-water mark came the next day when the managing editor wrote, "We
apologize if the graphic treatment offended black Philadelphians. We were
trying to explore and provide accurate information about an issue of great
concern to our community."
The story was entirely correct. Wanted for murder in the
city at that time were 41 African-Americans, 12 Hispanics and three Asians. As
Police Sgt. Bill Britt said at the time, "There are plenty of white guys
in jail for murder, but those guys are locked up."
There are plenty of long beards and black jackets out there.
But what matters to me is catching the criminals wearing them.
Listen to Michael Smerconish
weekdays 5:30-9 a.m. on the Big Talker, 1210/AM. Read him Sundays in the
Inquirer. Contact him via the Web at www.mastalk.com.