09x25 - Crime reporting in the American news media

[bunniefuu]

LAST WEEK TONIGHT
WITH JOHN OLIVER

Welcome to "Last Week Tonight"!

I'm John Oliver,
thank you so much for joining us.

It has been a busy week.
Russia's bridge to Crimea

was seriously damaged
in yet another setback for them,

Herschel Walker acted out


Joe Biden gave a speech at a factory
in Maryland that he began like this.

Let me start off with two words:
made in America.

Yeah, that's three words, Joe.
You just out-Biden-ed yourself.

I'm honestly surprised
the rest of the speech didn't go,

"Two words: made in America.
Five words: crushed it.

Nine words: yep.
Four words: you betcha."

We're going to start tonight in Iran.
The country where people heard:

"You can't make yogurt into a soda",
and were like, "The f*ck we can't!"

Don't knock it 'til you tried it,
by the way.

For the last three weeks, there've
been huge protests all over Iran,

following the k*lling of a young woman
named Mahsa Amini

after her arrest for violating
mandatory hijab rules

by Iran's so called
"morality police".

"Morality police" sounds like a fake
name that Tucker Carlson made up

for people who won't let him
say slurs anymore,

but it's a very real organization
that enforces dress and behavior rules,

and which has been newly energized
under a hard line new president

who took office last year.

For a while now, there's been
widespread discontent in Iran

over repression, corruption, inflation,
and economic pain

caused in part by U.S. sanctions.

But the death of Mahsa Amini
has unleashed a torrent of fury,

led by one group in particular.

Schoolgirls have now joined
antigovernment protests in Iran.

Here in capital Tehran,
they're marching in the streets,

chanting "death to the dictator".

The biggest thr*at
for more than a decade

to Iran's radical Islamic leadership
are now teenagers.

Teenagers are currently the scariest
thing to the Iranian government.

Which honestly feels right.
Teenagers are terrifying.

The list of groups I never want mad
at me goes, in ascending order,

the mafia,
the mafia from 50 years ago,

Jason Momoa, which is less
about him being physically imposing

and more about me
craving his approval,

robots, spiders after
they all learn to work together,

and then,
right at the top, teenage girls.

And the young women
at the forefront of these protests

have been making it very clear
that they are not afraid

to stand up to the morality police,
or, indeed, anybody.

This video
shows female students in shiraz,

shouting "Basijis get lost"

to a member of the feared
Basiji paramilitary force

who had been invited
to give a speech.

And in this video,
filmed near the capital Tehran,

Iranian schoolgirls,
many without their heads covered,

throw objects
at a man and chase him away.

Holy sh*t! The bravery of those girls
is genuinely incredible.

I presume the school that they attend

is The f*ck Around
and Find Out Academy for Girls.

And if that's not what it's called,
it should be from now on.

These protests are taking many forms,
and they are rapidly spreading online.

When Iranian women were filmed
cutting their hair in protest,

women around the world
started doing the same in solidarity.

Which is incredibly inspiring.
Although I will say,

it's also a little hurtful that when
Iranian women cut their own hair,

everyone supports them,
but when I cut my own hair,

everyone says I look like Amelie fell
head-first into a garbage disposal.

I'm not saying they were wrong,
I'm saying it is a double standard.

Now, unsurprisingly, the government
is now violently cracking down,

k*lling over 100 protestors
and bystanders.

And Ayatollah Khameini
has resorted to claiming

that America is behind these protests
and has been secretly instigating them.

It is not like America has not meddled
in Iran's affairs in the past,

but in this instance,
the protestors seem very clear

about who they are mad at,
and it is him.

These young girls no longer want
to see his face in their classrooms.

Instead, they wrote their dreams
behind his framed picture,

equality and freedom,
to turn this page of Iran's history.

That is extremely powerful to see.
And frankly, I don't blame those girls

for not wanting to see
that particular face every day,

even if he wasn't the symbol
of oppression and tyranny.

It looks like right before that picture
was taken, the photographer said,

"Ready? Three, two, one,
when a panda has twins,

it keeps the stronger one
and abandons the other.

Say cheese!" Perfect!

Now, as for what happens next,
it is hard to say.

There have been
civilian uprisings in Iran before

that the government snuffed out,
like the Green Movement in 2009.

And that could
well happen again here.

But as some Iranians have said,
this time does feel a little different.

The primary drivers of these
protests are young, defiant,

and they are fed up
with the status quo.

And they deserve
our sustained attention.

Because, to the young people of Iran,
let me say this.

If I may borrow some phrasing from
Joe Biden, I have two words for you:

you are all absolutely
f*cking amazing.

And now, this!

And Now: Christopher Columbus:
Kind of a Cool Guy.

Coming up on "Kudlow",
am I the only guy who thinks

Christopher Columbus
was really kind of a cool guy?

He discovered our hemisphere.

He risked life and limb to do it.
And now everybody's b*ating up on him.

I think that's very unfair
and he's not around to defend himself.

I'm not saying Christopher Columbus
was an angel by any means

or that he was a perfect individual,

but he obviously had some
major accomplishments.

We need to judge him by the standards
of his own time, not ours.

And by the way,
by those standards,

Christopher Columbus
was a pretty good guy.

We are flawed. Is Columbus flawed?
Sure, he's flawed. We're all flawed.

We've talked about this before,
Tucker, on your show.

Of course, he was flawed.
Who are we to judge?

For better or worse, Columbus
was an epic figure in human history.

He also brought back to Europe
something you may not be aware of,

which is potatoes.

Moving on.
Our main story tonight concerns crime.

McGruff's kink.
It's genuinely impressive

that this crime dog taught
a whole generation how to be narcs

while dressing like he's about to jerk
it in the back of a movie theater.

Specifically, we're going to talk about
how crime is covered by the news.

Because the news loves covering crime
sometimes seriously,

and sometimes like this.

Let's get this straight from the start:
you're Nedra Brantley, right?

I am.

- Is your name Mike?
- No, it's not.

This is what Nedra's car
looked like today.

"Mike is a cheater"
spray painted all over it.

Cheater, cheater,
Mike is a cheater.

Mike, Mike, Mike…

See what you've done?
I don't know who you are.

I don't know where you are.

But you may want
to start changing your ways,

or changing your name.

Yes! I want that man
on my TV all day, every day.

If you sent NBC4 Washington's
Pat Collins to Ukraine,

I guarantee you
it'd be sorted out tomorrow.

"Vlad, Vlad, Vlad,
see what you've done?"

You've undoubtedly noticed

that crime makes up a significant part
of your local news's programming.

But the scale of that coverage
has a real impact.

Research has shown
that viewing local TV news

is related to increased fear
of and concern about crime,

and that TV news viewers

are also more likely
to support tougher crime policies.

Which does help explain
why our perceptions of crime

can sharply be at odds
with the reality of it.

For over 30 years, Gallup
has asked Americans whether they think

the U.S. has more or less crime
compared to the year before,

and in every year except for one,

the public has said
that crime has increased,

even as the actual crime rate
has plummeted.

Now, the one year
that a majority said "less" was 2001.

Famously a year where everything
was super chill, no drama, just vibes.

TV news leans hard on "this could
happen to you" type of crime stories,

which are designed to pull you in,
with the latest version being this.

Authorities continue to sound the alarm
about the dangers of rainbow fentanyl.

Another warning about rainbow fentanyl,
the deadly drug disguised as candy.

It is called rainbow fentanyl.

The colorful candy-like appearance
is designed to appeal to young kids.

They're attractive, they're colorful,
they look like candy.

This is every parent's
worst nightmare.

Especially in the month of October,
as Halloween fast approaches.

This is treacherous deception to market
rainbow fentanyl like candy.

Okay, so, first, rainbow fentanyl

sounds like the title of a very special
episode of "My Little Pony".

But second, while the idea of rainbow
fentanyl being made to target kids

sounds very scary,

experts on narcotics have pointed out
that those pills are almost certainly

"colored to differentiate products"
and "it has nothing to do

with marketing to kids at all,
period, whatsoever".

Which does make sense, doesn't it,
because kids, and this is true,

are not an ideal customer base
for expensive street dr*gs.

Because even if dealers
were targeting trick-or-treaters

with a "first one's
on the house" strategy,

where do you expect Zeke to come up
with the cash for the next one?

He's got his weekly allowance,
but he smacked his brother yesterday,

so that's that dollar gone.

And the rest of his net worth
is tied up in Lego Store gift cards.

He is useless to dealers.
Maybe check back in 10 years

when he gets prescribed Oxy
after a lacrosse injury.

It is not to say that opioid addiction
among young people isn't a real issue,

it obviously is, but it doesn't help
the conversation around that issue

to have newscasters
jumping on splashy

"your kid's Halloween
candy could be fentanyl" stories

that even in this report,

they half-acknowledge is bullshit,
right at the very end.

Police departments
warning parents to check the candy

their kids bring home
from trick or treating.

We don't want to have kids

who are taking pills that they
think is candy and is really not.

There have been no instances
of that happening.

Yeah, of course not!

I'm so glad you tacked that disclaimer
on at the end there, though.

I'm sure that three-second debunk
read over the station logo

is exactly what everyone's
gonna take away from that report,

and definitely
not the images of little Hulks

sticking their hands
into bowls of Skittle-shaped smack.

But that instinct
to run an eye-catching crime story

without being skeptical of its sourcing
is unfortunately incredibly common.

So, given that, tonight, let's talk
about crime reporting,

specifically, the incentives
driving the outlets that cover crime,

the flawed sources
that they rely upon,

and the greater harm
that it can do to all of us.

And let's start with the obvious here.
Crime has always driven ratings.

The mantra "if it bleeds, it leads"
has been around for decades.

But the philosophy
really took hold around the 1970s,

when two local stations
in Philadelphia

pioneered the eyewitness
and action news formats,

which leaned heavily
on crime news.

As one anchor there explained,
"Crime was cheap to cover.

It was easy to cover. The assignment
desk said to the cameraman,

You sh**t the scene, the blood,
victims, whatever they got.

And you can do it in 20 seconds.
But that is not good.

The most meaningful stories
are rarely the fastest or the cheapest.

And I'm not
just saying that because I host

"Very Long News Stories
That Are Also Expensive to Produce:

The Comedy Show",
I'm saying it because it's true.

Those formats quickly spread
to 200 markets around the country.

And by the 1990s, CNN even did
a whole piece wondering

if all that crime coverage
was necessarily a good thing.

Crime news
can look a lot like entertainment.

The dark black is crime coverage.

One Los Angeles station,
a study shows,

spent over half its newscasts on crime.
Others came close.

I'm convinced
that if you could get everyone

who wanted to commit su1c1de
to do it on,

in a public place
where the media could be present,

we would have like a TV show
called "su1c1de Today".

Way to bring
down the room there, buddy.

But not to step on that
man's creative pursuits here,

there is already
primetime programming

where people k*ll
themselves for our entertainment.

It's called Monday Night Football.

Happy concussion season
football fans!

It sure feels like this sport
maybe shouldn't exist!

So, people have been raising the alarm
about our obsession with crime news

for a while now.

But it's clearly been hard
for news outlets to give it up.

As they are constantly making space
for stories about crimes,

be they major or incredibly minor,
often illustrated with mugshots.

The New York Daily News has mugshot
galleries on their website right now,

with titles like
"Criminally bad hair days,"

and "Babes behind bars."

And it's fun, isn't it?
It's fun because it's their worst day.

And the thing is,
the faces that get shown

can compound existing
inequities in our justice system,

a study a few years ago
here in New York

found that, while around a quarter
of the city's population is Black,

Black people made up
for half of all arrests,

and three-quarters
of criminals shown on the news.

Which is clearly going
to distort public perception.

And while outlets may justify
reporting on sensational arrests

as "part of the public interest",

far too often,
whether due to a lack of time,

or resources, or even inclination,

they don't follow up on what
the outcomes of those cases are.

Which can seriously
impact people's lives.

Take Darcell Trotter.

He and his brother were accused
of sexual as*ault in 2012,

by a woman who not only
recanted her accusations,

but pled guilty to filing
a false police report.

The problem is, their charges
had already made the local news,

which then never got around

to mentioning
that the charges were dismissed.

And years later, with uncorrected
stories still sitting on news sites,

Darcell was having
to make calls like these.

How you doing, Jim?
My name is Darcell Trotter,

and it was an article regarding
of being accused of sexual as*ault,

me, my twin brother.

Did we do a story
where the charges were dropped too?

No, you guys never did that.

We should've had a follow-up story
that charges were dropped.

I mean, that would have been nice.

It would have been! And if I could
talk to the Jim there for a second.

I don't know if that's short
for James, Jimothy, or Jimiroquai.

But either way, Jim,
your paper goofed.

You can't just report the start
of a story and ignore the end.

Imagine if the news hadn't
covered the end of balloon boy.

Guess he's still up there!

The balloon has left
my immediate line of vision,

so, who really gives a sh*t!

So, the news media can be overly
reliant on eye-catching crime stories

that are quick
and easy to turn around.

And the speed with which
the daily crime b*at operates

actually leads to one of the biggest
issues in crime coverage,

which is that it often relies
heavily on a single source.

It is why, if you watch the TV news
for any length of time,

you will undoubtedly hear
one particular phrase.

The Lovington police

say they know who is responsible
for a prank at a local park.

Police in Fairfield say an officer
was att*cked with bear spray.

Police say
no suspects are in custody.

Police say…

Police say…

Yeah, "police say",

it's a phrase that you constantly hear
from the mouths of news reporters.

It's right up there with,
"this just in" or "back to you",

or "I apologize for the accent
I did on Cinco de Mayo".

There is obviously nothing wrong with
calling the police to ask questions.

When you're working on a deadline,

you can't always reach
arrested civilians or their attorneys,

who sometimes don't even want
to talk with you anyway.

And police can be easy to reach,

many larger departments have set up
robust media-relations divisions.

The LA County Sheriff's Department
has 42 people on its information bureau

at an annual cost of $4.8 million,

and the LAPD spent over $3 million
for 25 people in similar units.

Which is already a little telling.

Because while a certain amount
of spending is necessary,

you don't spend that much
on PR if things are going great.

For context,
all those budgets combined

equal just one month's salary
for Ezra Miller's publicist.

They are so tired.
They need to sleep.

Even smaller police departments can
have public information officers, PIOs,

and as this one proudly notes his press
releases can make it straight to air.

Something major happens,

whether it's a sh**ting or some
major car accident, whatever it is.

You go back to your office.
You type up this long press release,

and you send it out to the public
and all the news agencies.

Within minutes, you have reporters
from all over the country calling you.

There's something
strangely satisfying

that when you put out
that press release, hours later,

you're watching the news, and every
station that's talking about your story

is literally reading your press release
word for word.

Set aside the fact that everything
about this man answers the question,

"What if Fred Durst but worse?"

That claim
that the police's versions of events

can be parroted verbatim
in the press is genuinely alarming.

Although I cannot really fault him
for being excited

at seeing his work
read word for word on TV.

Ask my writers and they'll tell you
they experience the exact same thrill

whenever I read
one of their little jizz jokes.

Their parents couldn't be prouder.

Chrissy, did you like hearing me
say your McGruff dog jerking it joke?

I bet you did,
you college graduate.

But the fact reporters will echo
PIOs does explain certain things,

like the ubiquity of phrases
like "officer-involved sh**ting".

You see it in police
accounts all the time,

but it's a weird term
for reporters to repeat,

because it deliberately
omits crucial information

about how the officer was involved.

If you went to someone's house
for dinner and they said,

"Tonight, there is
a rat-involved dinner",

you'd justifiably
have some follow up questions.

Are we going
to a Chuck-E-Cheese?

Is the chef being controlled
by a tiny French rat under his hat?

Or are we going to be on an episode
of "Kitchen Nightmares?"

All three are technically
"rat-involved",

but some options are easier
to live with than others.

Police departments don't always
need a PIO to push their narrative,

as outlets
will sometimes just grab sh*t

from a law enforcement
agency's social media.

Police love posting evidence
from busts that they've conducted,

like this one,
which a Texas news station

not only shared
on their own Facebook page,

but even included
on their evening broadcast.

A search warrant ex*cuted Monday
has left three people behind bars.

The Tenaha Police Department
has released information on the raid.

Among the items seized
were two pounds of marijuana,

illegally possessed prescription pills,

drug paraphernalia,
packaging materials, g*ns, and cash.

Now, if you don't really think
about what you are looking at there,

I guess that seems
like a story, right?

But is it?
Because, as many quickly pointed out,

when you examine that photo,

you realize not only
is that not a lot of dr*gs,

there is way less cash there

than they're going out
of their way to make it look.

Most of those are singles.

That is $70, total.

One commenter
on the station's post said,

"Sick. This is Playskool's
My First Dealer set,"

with another adding,
"Who was the drug dealer, El Cheapo?"

And that speaks
to the fact that there can be a gap,

sometimes small,
but sometimes massive,

between "the story police
are telling everyone",

and "the story
that actually happened".

Because cops' stories can,
for a lot of reasons,

turn out to be very wrong, in ways
both serious, and incredibly petty.

Take the trend of cops

claiming mistreatment
at the hands of fast-food employees,

which local news can be only
too happy to gobble right up.

A possible hate crime against police
is being investigated right now

at a Shake Shack
in Downtown Manhattan.

Sources tell CBS 2,
three officers became sick

after having shakes
from the restaurant tonight.

Police suspect an employee

may have contaminated
the drinks with bleach.

The Layton Police sergeant ordered
a sub and a lemonade from this Subway.

But after taking
a few sips of his drink,

he quickly found out he got
much more than what he paid for.

He was having a hard time maintaining
his body. His body was jerking.

What caused those side effects,
police say,

turned out to be a double dose
of illegal narcotics.

DJ, a local law enforcement officer
told eyewitness news

he suspects someone at McDonald's
took a bite from his sandwich

before he completed the sale.

Tonight, a McDonald's
in Junction City is investigating

after a police officer found insulting
words written on his coffee.

The F-word has been blurred out
in this image, of course,

but you can see the word "pig"
written right below it.

Okay, so, there is a lot there,
but real quick:

there was no bleach in the shakes,
no dr*gs in the lemonade,

the cop with the sandwich

later admitted he'd simply forgotten
he took a bite from it,

and the one with the coffee admitted
he'd written "f*cking pig" on his cup.

Which is a serious act of self-loathing
unless, that is, you are Miss Piggy,

in which case, it's a slay.

Outta the way boys, she's got fashion
to work and frog d*ck to slurp.

Who's coffee is that?
It's this f*cking pig's.

And that speaks to one of the major
problems with deferring to police.

Because, as many of you have
undoubtedly been yelling at your TV,

like I am a "Wheel of Fortune"
contestant who cannot solve the puzzle,

police lie, and they lie a lot.

As you've seen here, they've lied to
get search warrants to conduct raids,

and to get confessions
during interrogations,

and they even lie under oath,
so often in fact,

here in New York,
it came to be known as "testilying."

All of which should be more than
enough for the word of the police

to be treated with immense skepticism,
rather than repeated verbatim.

Take the notorious press release
the Minneapolis police

put out following
the m*rder of George Floyd titled,

"Man Dies After Medical Incident
During Police Interaction".

What you may not know is,
it was picked up almost word for word

by local news the next morning.

We do begin this morning
with developing news.

A man is dead after what police

are calling a medical distress
after being handcuffed.

Now, officers were responding
to a forgery in progress.

It happened on the 3700 block
of Chicago Avenue South.

When they arrived, officers found
a man they believed to be the suspect

sitting inside a car.

They apparently told him to get out.
He resisted.

Officers eventually
got him handcuffed,

which is when he appeared
to have the medical issue.

The suspect was taken to the hospital,
where he d*ed a short time later.

Obviously, that is a hugely
self-serving statement from the police.

Because by saying "George Floyd
d*ed because of medical distress",

their role was completely erased.

His "medical distress",

and I'm using the biggest air
quotes humanly possible here,

was the result of an officer
pressing his knee into his neck

for nine minutes.

Repeating that claim by the police
is an act of malpractice akin

to Walter Cronkite saying,
"JFK d*ed of a headache today".

Sure, it's not technically wrong,

but it's the understatement
of the f*cking century.

The point is, it was only after
the release of cell phone footage

recorded by a brave 17-yearold girl,
that that police narrative fell apart.

Otherwise, that bullshit press release

might well have been the version
of events that everybody heard.

And that's not a one-off.

An investigation last year
of police killings in California

found "at least a dozen examples

of initial police statements
misrepresenting events",

with reports citing
"vague 'medical emergencies'

without disclosing that officers
had caused the emergencies

through their use of force."

And "in most instances,
media outlets

repeated the police version of events
with little skepticism."

Which clearly isn't good!

There is a time and a place for media
outlets to operate without skepticism,

and we all know
it's the cover of health magazines,

not an ounce of critical thinking
on this extremely real cover

that includes the headlines,
"Lose 9 waist inches in 21 days"

and "News! A potato a day ups
weight loss by 340%!"

That is rock-solid science,
presumably!

There are times where the trust that
reporters place in some police sources

has been particularly egregious.

Just take what happened in Chicago,

after the police sh*t teenager
Laquan McDonald 16 times.

In their initial coverage,
multiple local outlets

featured interviews with one
particular person on the scene,

whose version of events
heavily favored the police.

I don't know
what his mental state was,

but he wasn't dropping the Kn*fe
and he was coming at the officer.

You aren't going to sit down
and have a cup of coffee with him.

He is a very serious thr*at
to the officers,

and he leaves them no choice
at that point but to defend themselves.

Well, that's a very detailed picture
painted by Palm Beach Potato Head,

but a few things, first,
while he sounds like an eyewitness,

he was not there for the incident.

Second, videotape later revealed

that the story he was telling
was complete horseshit,

police sh*t McDonald
when he was walking away from them.

But finally, reporters should've known
to take anything that guy said

with a massive grain of salt
because Pat Camden

was the spokesperson for the
Chicago Fraternal Order of Police,

which functions as part police union,
part special interest lobby group.

His only agenda was to protect cops.

And it was way too easy
for this 'lil mustachioed weirdo

to hear there was a sh**ting,
drive to the scene,

jump in front of cameras,
and grab control of the narrative.

And Camden did this a lot.

One analysis found that,
in a four-year timespan,

he "provided an initial version
of events for 35 police sh**t."

And in 15 cases,
crucial aspects of his statements

were later proved to be false
or misleading, which is just wild.

If you get caught cheating at one
casino, they ban you from every casino.

This guy peddled bullshit
to the press 15 times,

and somehow his picture wasn't pinned
behind every news desk in the country,

with the warning
"Do not ask this man about anything".

So often, it seems like news outlets

would be serving their communities
much better

if they weren't quite so trusting
when it came to what police tell them.

And to see a lot of what I've talked
about tonight in one place,

just take what happened
in Brookside, Alabama,

where a few years ago,
local news was excitedly reporting

on a new initiative
from their police department,

which "police said"
was getting real results.

We tell you stories
all the time about crime going up,

but we got some good news,

the town of Brookside
says they're seeing crime go down.

Brookside is not a big town,
but its narcotics interdiction team?

They've been busy.

Another drug bust
this weekend on I-22.

And the Brookside Police
have been so busy.

Our number one goal
is to not prosecute people.

It's to save lives.
That's why we got into this.

We want to save lives.
We want to keep our citizens safe.

We want to keep people who
are coming to Brookside safe

and enjoy our town.

All that coverage is just so weird.

It's part local news fluff,
part propaganda,

and something bordering on a tourism
ad from officer Teddy Ruxpin there.

But it's a bit strange
that one tiny town in Alabama

had suddenly become
a hotbed for drug smuggling, right?

Well, it turns out, yes.
And I will say, to its credit,

one local station
did dig a little deeper,

airing a report about the fact
that a weird amount of drivers

were questioning the tickets
written by that police department.

A story, incidentally, that led
that department to tell employees

that anyone talking
to that reporter would be fired.

But it wasn't until two years later
that an investigation from AL-dot-com

revealed what had actually
been happening,

and that is that Brookside,
a town of just 1,200 people,

was having its finances rocket-fueled
by tickets and aggressive policing,

with bullshit traffic tickets being
issued at a truly ridiculous rate.

Brookside dragged
so many people into court

that police had to direct traffic
on court days.

Money from fines and forfeiture
soared more than 600%

to the point where it made up
half the town budget.

It's true, it got to the point
where the police department

was taking in "$487 for every man,
woman, and child,"

and spending it on, among
other things, a SWAT team, a jail,

a fleet of unmarked cars,
and "two drug-sniffing dogs,"

one of which they named,
and this is true, K9 Cash.

Here is that dog. And I will say,
he does look like a K9 Cash.

And that's not a compliment.
Bad dog.

But the point is, what was
actually happening in Brookside

turned out to be a pretty
far cry from the initial coverage

of, "Hey, great news,
this small-town police force

is apparently Miami Vice all of a
sudden, anyway, no further questions."

And the thing is,
by presenting police uncritically,

you're not just helping
them dodge accountability,

you're giving them
a huge lobbying platform.

Right now, you don't have
to look far to find cops on TV,

suggesting that the fix
for any rise in crime

is to undo the criminal
justice reforms of the past few years,

and to give them more money.

And this can get real results.

Even the current rainbow fentanyl
scare started with a DEA press release,

which happened to drop as Congress
was in the midst of budget negotiations.

Everyone picked up that story,
and what do you know,

last week,
Chuck Schumer announced his intention

to allocate nearly 300 million
more dollars to law enforcement,

so that they can fight
the scourge of rainbow fentanyl.

And look, I'm not saying
all crime reporting is bad.

There is some incredible
coverage out there.

We feature it
on this show all the time,

and a lot of what I told you tonight
came from investigative reporting.

But the daily crime b*at,
whether from lack of resources,

lack of scrutiny,
or lack of followthrough

far too often
takes police at their word,

and not as an interest group
who should be treated as such.

So, what should happen here?

The police could change the ways
that they both behave and communicate.

But given that's not gonna
be happening anytime soon,

it unfortunately
falls to the rest of us.

News outlets could try and snap out
of their a*t*matic deference to police.

Which is actually possible.

Just watch what happened when
a political web series from The Hill

invited on a public defender
to discuss the case of Jayland Walker,

who was k*lled by police
after fleeing a traffic stop.

Watch her push back

when the host seems a little too
eager to accept the police line.

There's no world,
no traffic infraction,

the punishment is death,
not a one, never.

There's no reason why 8 officers should
choose to go and sh**t him to death.

I don't have a lot of sympathy
in this particular case…

You don't have a lot of sympathy in
this case where he was sh*t 60 times?

After leading the police on a
high-speed chase and returning fire?

Let me just say this…

Too often media reports
on what are police stories

as though it is the ultimate truth.

We see too many discrepancies

for us to consistently lean
on what the police say is the truth.

Police say, which has not yet
been substantiated or corroborated…

They say they believe that one b*llet
might have come from the window.

Their argument is maybe…

- Who knows if that's true?
- Exactly.

But I know is that they sh*t this boy


We'll have our Rising panel
join us next.

That is amazing. If for nothing else
than to watch baby Ryan Seacrest

try to wrap up the segment
after getting his ass handed to him.

But while it's incredible
to watch him,

in real time, backtrack from
"I don't have a lot of sympathy"

to "Absolutely, I agree,
who knows what's true?"

it should not be incumbent on
that woman to walk him to that point.

She can't be on every local news set.
She has a life to live.

And there are small changes that might
help reorient all of our thinking.

Some experts have suggested that,
rather than going with "police say",

outlets should consider
going with "police claim" instead,

which seems like a good start.

And to be fair, some outlets
are looking at other changes.

Some, like the USA Today Network,

have stopped publishing
mug sh*t galleries, saying

they "feed into negative stereotypes
and are of limited news value."

Which they are.
And The Arizona Republic

has pledged that it will follow
any case that it covers

to its conclusion,
in courts or otherwise.

Which, hopefully,
will save people like Darcell Trotter

from having to make phone calls
like the incredibly restrained one

that you saw him make earlier.

But the larger cultural change
might be for outlets

to fundamentally reconsider
whether the crimes they're covering

are actually newsworthy.

Because the truth is,
not all crimes are.

And crime is only one small slice
of the much bigger picture

that they could be painting
of what's happening in communities.

The fact is, because crime news
is pumped at us 24/7,

the way it's reported
is deeply linked

with how it's both perceived by
the public and prosecuted by the state.

And look, we've said before,
local news is incredibly important,

which is why it is so critical
that it is done well.

So, to the outlets who do put
an undue amount of weight

on police statements and prioritize
sensational crime coverage

over more complete
pictures of public safety,

if I may, I would like to throw it
over to one of your own.

See what you've done?
I don't know who you are.

I don't know where you are.

But you may want to
start changing your ways.

Exactly. And now, this.

And Now: Another Installment
of Local News b*at Poetry

from NBC4
Washington's Pat Collins.

They call it drifting,
but it's anything but that.

Look at the skid marks.

They go round and round

and round and round and round!

It's enough to make you dizzy.

In this park, there was a biting,
there was a sighting,

there was a trapping.

And tonight, one fox is in custody.

It happened way up there.

What could cause
something like this?

There was no earthquake.

This is something
less than an act of God.

It appears to be a big scrape job.

That's our show, thanks for watching.
We'll see you next week, good night!

It's not just the words,
it's the driver-side mirror.

It's the windshield,

boom, boom, and boom!