Crime stories are an important part of the journalistic tapestry. Being a crime reporter is a difficult job, since you are constantly barraged with tragedies, horrific details and the pain of victims. On a technical side, covering crime is filled with legal dangers and confusing statistics.
Here are some tips on writing solid crime stories for DigitalJournal.com:
• Find crime events that the mainstream media may have missed. Local stories can have national implications if they relate to a larger trend (drug smugglers caught shipping pot from Mexico to U.S. could relate to the DEA's mandate of stemming drug imports, e.g.).
• Don't implicate an individual in a crime if he or she has simply been charged or arrested. You can write your story without naming the person ("A 26-year-old Toronto man has been charged with three counts of owning child pornography") and at the very end you may add a name ("Joe Blow will appear in Toronto courts tomorrow"). You can't say things like "John Smith beat and stabbed the woman..." when those facts haven't been proven in a court of law. Instead, you should say "Police say the man beat and stabbed the woman..." This may save your skin if a lawyer ever suggests certain media companies have linked a person with a crime he or she may have not committed. Accusing someone who hasn't been found guilty in a court of law can be considered defamation, libel and slander.
• Be fair. Try to cover both sides of the story, from the police angle to the perspective of the accused, if possible. Also, are you covering crime in low-income neighbourhood only or are you reporting on events in all communities?
• Avoid obtuse language. Don't write "inner city" when you can name the street instead. Be wary of judging someone, as in calling someone "crazy" if you can use words such as "suffering from mental health problems." Make sure you have evidence of such facts.
• Crime stats can be frustrating to decipher, so find out the source first to see if there is any conflict of interest. Don't draw parallels if there aren't any. What you can do is look for trends and see if any expert or detective backs up a theory you may have. Do some digging when possible.
• Avoid adding irrelevant and possibly litigious photos. For a photo about a double-murder, don't search on Flickr for any crime scene. Never use a generic shot of a person to illustrate a story on a specific crime because the person in the photo (who is not involved in the crime) can claim you defamed them. If there aren't applicable photos to use, go photo-less. However, let's say you write a crime event about a drug bust. You can use generic photos of applicable drugs, like marijuana or cocaine, without including any human faces in the shot.
• Make sure the writing in your crime story is still lively, entertaining and original. No one said that crime stories have to be bland (contrary to popular belief). Use intriguing phrasings and vary the story with short and long sentences. Stick to the facts but give the story your own flavour.
Some final words of inspiration: A crime reporter
wrote an essay in the Charlotte (N.C.) Observer recently about the value crime reporters offer. Melissa Manware defended the crime beat, saying:
Maybe this story will convince someone to reach out to a friend or co-worker in need. Maybe this will move a woman to leave a violent relationship, a drug addict to seek help, or a rape victim to come forward. Maybe it will lead someone to come forward with information about who committed this horrible crime.
Stories change lives, they give voices to the voiceless and, most importantly, they remind all of us of our humanity.
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