Media Representations of the Courts

My final blog will place the media representations of courts under the microscope and I will link the themes to an article I sourced from the Sydney Morning Herald about the NRL player Brett Stewart called ‘Brett Stewart ordered to stand trial’.

In the criminal justice system the courts represent the pole of open justice as opposed to prisons which are hidden away. Whilst anyone is allowed to just walk into open court and watch trials (transparency), the reality is that no one has the time to do this, so once again, we are reliant on the media for our information. So the question is, how are courts represented in the media? Brennan (1997) asserts that the scant media attention that courts receive in contrast to the executive and legislature is due to the nature of the courts proceedings which are complex and boring. The courts are focused on the individual, not on grand questions of policy and for this reason they can be seen as out of sympathy with popular sentiment. The court proceedings are encased with legal jargon which requires sound legal knowledge of the court processes from the journalist who must decipher the terminology and present to the public.

Court cases which involve celebrities however seem to be able to transcend and overcome these difficulties, and causality could perhaps be attributed to the media’s obsession with the celebrity which increase a story’s newsworthiness (Jewkes, 2004). The OJ Simpson and Michael Jackson trials are testament to this rhetoric and so is the story concerning NRL player Brett Stewart who assaulted a 17 year old girl. The article fails to mention legal opinion or reference to any breach of legislation (in depth analysis is sacrificed for simplification) yet has several short quotes from Brett Stewart ‘I didn’t touch her bro’ (Kontominas, 2010) which caters to the public’s thirst for entertainment. These short statements also make for excellent sound bites. The exclusion of an in depth analysis, reminds me of the point made be Jacinta the guest lecturer who stressed the difficulty of expressing legal opinion in such a short time frame.

However, one can’t be too critical towards the journalists, because according to Kirby (2002) the blame, in part must be shouldered by judges themselves, who make it difficult for communication by making no summaries, interviews or press conferences for the press, which highlights the animosity between the courts and the media. This problematic relationship has been somewhat offset with the introduction of public information officers, who are a conduit to the judiciary by providing access to materials like evidence and transcripts for journalists (Johnston, 2008). This remedy has not counterbalanced the media/ court relationship to a functioning equilibrium and I think allowing TV cameras in some courtrooms is an idea that has much merit.

References

Brennan, G. (1997) ‘The third branch and the fourth estate’, Broadcasting, society and the law, Dublin: University College of Dublin.

Jewkes, Y. (2004) ‘Media and Crime’ 1st ed. London: Sage Publications.

Johnston, J. (2008) ‘The court media interface: bridging the divide’, Australian Journalism Review, vol.30 (1) p: 27-37, (Online) http://search.informit.com.au/fullText;dn=20081031;res=APAFT Accessed 1st September 2010

Kirby, M. (2002) ‘Media and courts – the dilemma’, (Online) http://www.hcourt.gov.au/speeches/kirbyj/kirbyj_dilemma.htm Accessed 1st September 2010

Kontominas, M. (2010) ‘Brett Stewart ordered to stand trial’, Sydney Morning Herald,(Online) http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/brett-stewart-ordered-to-stand-trial-20100322-qpo7.html Accessed 1 September 2010

The Politicization of the NSW Police Force

This week we examined how the police are represented in the media, and in the lecture we discussed the police and media relationship. It is the latter which I will discuss in this blog, inconjuction with an article I sourced online called ‘Spinning the Media: When PR Really Means Police Relations’.

The underlying theme that the guest lecturer Brett was asserting was the need for the NSW Police to balance the public’s right to access of information, which generally occurs via the media. Brett described the difficulties associated with the Police External Agencies Transfer System (PEATS) and how the police only provide skeleton information on each PEAT job (reducing organization transparency) which makes it difficult for a reporter to discern the major jobs. A counterpoint by Alyce was that there are many PEAT jobs and that the Police don’t have the resources to provide enough detail. According to Hollins and Bacon (2010) there are 6000 PEATS a day, so it can hardly be argued that the NSW Police aren’t releasing information on crime.

In March 2008, the NSW Police radios became digitally encrypted, as prior to this, journalists and criminals were able to listen to all police dialogue on the short wave radios. Tim Archer from the NSW Police Media Unit (PMU) states that the ‘Police use the media to ‘improve behavior by increasing perception of detection, increase police visibility, highlight good police work and reduce the fear of crime’ (Hollins and Bacon, 2010). The NSW Police are trying to create a positive representation of their organization via the media. This means that accounts of police misconduct and corruption aren’t likely to be released, as this tarnishes the reputation of the NSW Police. Echoing the rhetoric asserted by Brett is that of Hollins and Bacon (2010) who state that many journalists consider the PMU a restrictor of information.

The prosecution of NSW Superintendent Adam Purcell by the Police Integrity Commission which was raised by Brett, sends a clear message to NSW Police officers that it isn’t worth sacrificing your career to help a journalist. This can be linked back to the idea of the politicization of the NSW Police Force and the idea of the Police Hierarchy and executives bending to their masters. The NSW Police wish to maintain their image, and whilst, according to Mawby (2003) some news programs are outside of police control, they can control those within their grasp. The PMU has destroyed the traditional relationship between police officers and journalists, as opinions offered by some officers might not necessarily have fit with the aforementioned image. The creation of the PMU has allowed for solidarity amongst police opinion.

From the article and lecture content, I think that the balance of access to information is tipped in favor of the police at the moment. This is detrimental to the quality of news as journalists are not able to confirm reliability and quality of information, as they are pressured to publish articles (especially with the demand of 24 hour online coverage). Stories are than published which could be potentially untrue or dangerous to police operations.

References

Hollins, N. and Bacon, W. (2010) ‘Spinning the Media: When PR Really Means Police Relations’, (Online) http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/03/29/spinning-the-media-when-pr-really-means-police-relations/ Accessed 24th August 2010

Mawby, R.C. (2003) ‘Completing the “Half-Formed Picture”? Media Images of Policing’, in Mason, P. (ed.). Criminal Visions: Media Representations of Crime and Justice. Cullompton: Willan Publishing. Pp 214-237.

How the Mainstream Media has Distorted the Actualities of Prison Life

This week we discussed media representations of prisons, and in this blog I will apply the major themes we explored and my own research to some articles I sourced online about prisoners called, ‘Carl Williams Dies in Jail’ and ‘No Bail, go Directly to Jail’.

In the first week, we learnt that our perceptions of crime are created via a mediated experience through the media, as most people have very little direct contact with the criminal justice system. This rings particularly true for the prison system which is the most alien facet of the criminal justice system, as prisons are hidden away in a ‘backstage’ area, away from the public (Marsh and Melville, 2009, p.128). Closely linked to the ideas of newsworthiness is the notion that media representation of prison can be dichotomized into two extremes; prison as a holiday camp or prison as dangerous and violent. It is the latter with which these articles lend themselves too.

The first article states that the assailant ‘snuck up behind Williams and struck him several times in the head with the stem of the bike’ (ABC News, 2010) and in the second article we read the prisoner ‘was called a rock spider and given two serious beatings. He lost teeth and part of the sight in one eye’ (Sydney Morning Herald, 2010). These powerful images shape our perceptions of prison life, as one marked with brutality and murder, which represent the extreme pole of violence as described by Marsh and Melville. The murder of a Carl Williams in prison is a poignant example of the state failing in their duty of care. The media’s distorted representation of prison life sees that the popular view of prisons are promoted; that prisoners are a violent, undeserving and hazardous underclass who don’t deserve rights (Jewkes, 2004, p.75). This is reflected in the second article as the prisoner is constantly dehumanised, as he is referred to as a sex offender not by his real name, Justin Fillpetti

According to Yousman (2000, p.9), despite the media’s obsession with crime and violence, once a criminal is convicted, they tend to disappear into the system and media coverage is relatively scant, except in exceptional circumstances such as prison escapes. Such rhetoric can be applied to the article of Carl Williams, which involved a high profile gang member murder in the prison system. The actual, mundane and routine environment that was Carl William’s prison experience is not reported in the popular media or is the case of Justin Filipetti, as these actualities do not meet the news threshold. Yousman (2009, p.9) asserts that whilst the high profile cases receive some attention, the mainstream media coverage of prison conditions in which prisoners live is woefully scarce.

The two articles which I have analysed today from the mainstream media fuel the public perceptions that prisons are violent and dangerous. However, drawing back on the pluralisation theory, I think it could be argued that such an extreme perception is able to be counterbalanced somewhat by the diversity of new media and opinion. The solution; read and watch from a wide variety of sources, as to gain a better understanding of prison realties.

I would like to leave you with an off the cuff hypothesis; is this violent portrayal of prisons in the media necessarily all bad? If the public are under the impression that all prisons are violent and dangerous than perhaps this image acts as a deterrent to not break the law.

References

ABC News. (2010) ‘Carl Williams bashed and killed in jail, (Online) http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/04/19/2876669.htm Accessed 21st August 2010

Jewkes, Y. (2004) ‘Media and Crime’, Sage, London.
Marsh, I. and Melville, G. (2009). ‘Crime, Justice and the Media’ 1st ed. Routledge, London.

Sydney Morning Herald. (2010) ‘No bail, go directly to jail, (Online) http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/no-bail--go-directly-to-jail-20100416-skg7. Accessed 21st August

Yousman, B. (2009) ‘Prime time prisons on U.S TV: Representation of incarceration, Peter Lang Publishing, New York, (Online) http://books.google.com.au/books?id=_Xp0zW6v88C&pg=PA1&dq=media+representations+of+prison&hl=en&ei=_NJsTP6iKMqHcfnayZUN&sa=X& Accessed 19th August 2010

How News Values Create a Story

This week my blog will focus on the omni present news values that journalists utilize to guide and shape their work, and in a sense are slaves to the notions of public appeal and newsworthiness. I have selected a story titled ‘Man jailed over veteran attack’ which I sourced from ABC online and will apply the news values from the works of Jewkes, as these values are more recent and have been reformulated from Chibnall to keep up with the changing nature of media.

The media article details how a 29 year man, robbed a World War 2 veteran, trapping him under his motorised scooter. This notion plays into the idea of the risk value (articulated by Anthony Gidden’s in his work regarding the risk society) which also overlaps with the values of simplification, personalisation, individualism and conservative ideology. The media in this story have presented an unambiguous, linear narrative with little room for critique and interpretation. They have demonised the offender and created the simple rhetoric of right versus wrong, thereby eliminating any shades of grey and opportunities for constructive and meaningful interpretivism. The article attributes the causation factors of the robbery to individualistic explanations (the story lets it be known that the offender is both a heroin addict and has a mental illness), while ignoring the wider, often more complex, socio economic structures which cultivate the conditions for such crimes, such as access to welfare, employment and rehabilitation . The broader cultural, social and political conditions surrounding heroin addiction and mental health care aren’t able to be simplified and refined for this article and don’t create the right angle for this story, therefore, those important notions become obsolete, to appease the sacrosanct news threshold.

Now onto risk; the risk value which has been capsulated in this story, (which is indivisible from the concept of fear of crime, which is exacerbated under the paradigm of neo liberalism and the rise self security and responsibility), is articulated by this crime which is been portrayed as unpredictable, random and meaningless (the offender made off with only $20). The vulnerable victim (who could just be you one day, and is an exploitation of one's personal anxieties) was left lying on the ground crying for help. This angle emphasises the notion of the risk value, as in today’s risk society, violent criminals can strike at any time, indiscriminately. This rhetoric stresses the image of the victim; which the story does to a tee, by reporting the health condition of the victim after the attack, who states "The attack forced me to change my lifestyle... I only go out in the day now' (Farnsworth, 2010).

This article borrows from the conservative ideology value, in that it is stated that the offender will receive 12 months jail. This sentence emphasises punitive ‘popular justice’ and only goes to reinforce and cement the philosophy of tough law and order policies, taken to so adeptly by NSW politicians to stamp out crime, focusing on retribution while rehabilitation sits idle in the dark. These are values that journalists deem newsworthy as we witness deviants been isolated by policies of containment, incapacitation and surveillance.

I will finish this week with a personal reflection. After summing up the last three weeks worth of reading I am left with new feelings of apathy and disenchantment, as to the false realities which are distorted, inflated and constructed by the media in the pursuit of newsworthiness and profit. On the other hand, all the reading, theories and dialogue have also been empowering, as it has granted me the power and tools to discern and critique, the daily façade that is the media, as well as injecting a sense of realism into my perceptions of crime and reality.

Here is a link to the full article.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/09/2977574.htm?section=justin

Reference List

Farnsowrth, S. (2010) ‘Man jailed over veteran attack’, ABC News, (Online) http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/09/2977574.htm?section=justin
Accessed 10th August 2010

Crime and Media According to Marx

This week I was watching an episode of Under Surveillance on channel 7 and I thought I would try to apply one of the theories that we read about this week surrounding media and crime to deconstruct and analyse the show.

According to Marsh and Melville (2009) the Marxist approach stresses the power of the media to control people in society, with an overarching goal to maintain the social and economic order for the capitalist (as these conditions allow for the exploitation of surplus labour and continuing of the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few). When I first read the Marxist theory I thought it was a little farfetched, and belonged back in the 1960’s. But after some discussion and more reading, I was able to see the merits of Marxism and how it applies to media and crime today. The show that I watched this week depicted the investigation and apprehension of a Sydney Drug Baron named Richard Buttrose. The show illustrated the arduous hours that police undertook for surveillance (6 months worth), as well as the clever tactics of police entrapment, police professionalism and really amplified the power and accuracy of police intelligence. It should be noted that these elements were not discussed in such detail that would allow an individual to harness them in their own deviant pursuit of crime (criminogenic elements) but presented them in a manner, to persuade the public that these crime control methods are highly efficient and effective. Subliminally, what this does is create an image in the mind of the public, that the Police are some invincible, ever watching and unstoppable power that will apprehend you if you dare to break the law and cause a rupture in the social order (we know that this is not the norm, and that many cases go unsolved). So where does Marxism fit into all this?

Illegal activity like drug trafficking and protection rackets, generates wealth that feeds into a black market economy. In this episode of Under Surveillance, the police seized almost twelve million dollars worth of cash and drugs. I would suspect that the ruling class or capitalists aren’t all in favour of this illegal economy as it is money that they are not generating themselves, and is essentially wasted resources. The capitalist law and order agenda than, is characterized by conservatism, which is pursued by the mainstream media (which itself is becoming ever more concentrated, by capitalists). The popular media images continually portray the iron hand of the law (with the exception of new media which boats diversity and opinion). Popular crime entertainment and infotainment programs are notorious for showing the apprehension of the offender through clever police work. This in turn enforces the public’s attitude of, why commit crime when there looks like a very strong possibility of getting caught? With the media as an instrument, anomalies such as crime are contained to a minimum and discouraged, while the economy and social order continue to function, unchecked in favour of the ruling class.

I would like to finish this week's blog with yet another quote, which ties up the ideas of Marxism and the media;

'Although the media claim to reinforce public opinion it is worth asking whether they are a voice for the people or a propaganda tool for the rich and powerful' (Elridge, 1997, p.123).

Reference Page

Elridge, J., Kitzinger, J. And Williams, K. (1997) The Mass Media and Power in Modern Britian, Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Marsh, I., & Melville, G. (2009) Crime, Justice and the Media, Routledge, New York