Covering the Courts: Free Press, Fair Trials, and Journalistic Performance

ISBN-13: 9780765804624 / Angielski / Miękka / 1999 / 158 str.

Robert Giles; Robert W. Snyder

Opis

Covering the Courts shows how writers and journalists deal with present-day major trials, such as those involving Timothy McVeigh and O.J. Simpson. The volume features such outstanding contributors as Linda Deutsch and Fred Graham, and provides an in-depth look at the performance of the court in an age of heightened participation by reporters, camera operators, social scientists, major moguls of network radio and television, and advocates of special causes. The volume does far more than discuss specifi c cases. Indeed, it is a major tool in the study of the new relationships between a free press and a fair trial. Interestingly, a consensus is described in which the parties involved in efforts to balance freedom of the press and the right to a fair trial are moving in tandem. In this regard, sensitive issues, ranging from the universality of law to the particularity of racial, religious, and gender claims, are explored with great candor. The volume also turns the intellectual discourse to its major players: the members of the press, the lawyers, and the judiciary. Has there been a shift from reporting functions to entertainment values? Does television and live presentation shift the burden from the contents of a case to the photogenic and star quality of players? What excites and intrigues the public: serious disturbances to the peace and mass mayhem, such as the Oklahoma bombings or sexual adventures of entertainment and sports fi gures? The fi ndings are sometimes disturbing, but the reading is never dull. This book will be of interest to journalists, lawyers, and the interested general public.

Spis treści

I: Free Press, Fair Trial; 1: No Contest; 2: Lessons from the Timothy McVeigh Trial I; 3: Lessons from the Timothy McVeigh Trial II; 4: The Reardon Ruckus; 5: The Thicket of Rules North of the Border; II: Cameras in the Courts; 6: Doing Justice with Cameras in the Courts; 7: Lessons from the O.J. Simpson Trial I; 8: Lessons from the O.J. Simpson Trial II; 9: Flash and Trash; 10: What Gets on the Networks?; 11: The Camera-Shy Federal Courts; 12: Journalism Meets Art; III: Cross-Examinations; 13: The Third Branch and the Fourth Estate; 14: Justice by the Consent of the Governed; 15: Virgins, Vamps and the Tabloid Mentality; 16: Feeding the Ravenous Appetite of the Press; 17: The Role of the Media in Exposing Crimes Against Humanity; IV: Review Essay; 18: Cast a Cautious Eye on the Supreme Court; For Further Reading

O autorze

Robert Giles