Annotated Bibliography on the Media, Crime and the Acquittal of Amanda Knox

Tales of the ‘Angel-faced killer’ or ‘Foxy Knoxy’ have captivated audiences on an international scale, with the murder of British exchange student, Meredith Kercher, becoming a media sensation and debated topic within Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States in particular. Amanda Knox was convicted and imprisoned for the death of her roommate in 2007 and following a lengthy appeal process was recently acquitted of the crime on the 3^rd of October 2011. The following articles discuss the value and newsworthiness that is attributed to criminal cases, especially when there is a female, sexual element involved. They also explore the impact that public relations has had on influencing the media and the common spectator.

Sacco, V.F. (1995). Media Constructions of Crime. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 539(1), 141-154. doi. 10.1177/0002716295539001011

The author of the article is a Professor of Sociology at Queen’s University and has published a plethora of articles and books pertaining to the study of criminal events. With a strong background in criminology and urban sociology, Sacco is particularly interested in the public perception of crime and the sensational publicity afforded to certain cases. ‘Media Constructions of Crime’ addresses the concept of news values and how crime constitutes a large part of media reportage and discussion. Sacco argues that the perspective of the police is often privileged and glorified in order to illustrate their effectiveness to audiences. The dramatization of crimes involving atypical circumstances or a celebrity element is also addressed, where the media distinguishes clear villains from victims in order to present a compelling narrative to audiences. The article is well researched with reference to other elite criminology and media journals and uses infamous case studies such as the Menendez Brothers’ shotgun murders, the O.J. Simpson trial and Lorena Bobbit incident, in order to exemplify its arguments. Sacco also comments on the shifting interest and evolving definition of appropriateness within the media landscape, as highly sexualized and controversial crimes that would not traditionally have been covered become front page and headline material.

Burleigh, Nina. (2011, October 5). Amanda Knox: Fascination With ‘The Evil Female’. CNN International Edition.   

Author, journalist and contributing editor to Salon.com and Elle Magazine, Nina Burleigh is a respected writer who also acts as an adjunct professor at Columbia University. Having written the non-fiction novel The Fatal Gift of Beauty: The Italian Trials of Amanda Knox, Burleigh is uniquely qualified to comment on the acquittal of Amanda Knox and offer informed opinions on the treatment and perception of the case within the media. The article was published online by CNN International, which is one of the largest and most reputable news organizations within the world. CNN International covers a wider variety of issues ranging from current affairs to the arts, politics and business. Burleigh’s article is an opinionative piece that criticizes the prosecution and public’s vilification of the female while ignoring the male criminal element. The online story adopts a unique angle that focuses on the persecution of Knox rather than on the actual acquittal, arguing that the Italian mindset is predisposed towards a negative and mistrustful view of beautiful women. Sacco’s arguments about the sensational and celebrity status attributed to crimes involving a sexualized aspect or a compelling perpetrator are relevant to Burleigh’s article, as both authors argue that many other crucial facets of a criminal case are neglected as a result of the media’s desire to focus on what they deem the most valuable and newsworthy element.

Pisa, Nick. (2011, October 3). Guilty: Amanda Knox Looks Stunned as Appeal Against Her Murder Conviction is Rejected. Mail Online.

Pisa’s article is a remarkable example of journalistic misconduct, as it publishes a false outcome of the Amanda Knox trial in its efforts to be ahead of other competing news outlets. The headline reads ‘Guilty,’ with the story offering a fake description of a distraught Knox surrounded by her weeping friends and family. The level of fabrication is astounding, with the article containing fake quotes from the prosecution and stating that Knox and Sollecito were taken back to their respective prisons and were due to undergo suicide watch and routine psychological evaluations. The portions of the article that refer to the circumstances of the murder and the subsequent investigation and prosecution are accurate, implying that research has been performed and that the predicted guilty verdict was simply overlaid on top of the piece. The article appeared on the website Mail Online or dailymail.co.uk that is owned by the United Kingdom newspaper the Daily Mail. Despite its popularity, the online news-site is extremely tabloid-like and is not to be trusted without outside corroboration or a subsequent follow-up report. The article exemplifies the competitive nature of journalism and how news ethics that are hinged upon the truth are often sacrificed in an effort to be the first to break the story.

Sawyer, Diane. (2011, October 3). Amanda Knox Acquitted, Innocent and Set Free. ABC News (Television broadcast).

Hosted by veteran news-anchor Diane Sawyer, the ABC News Special Report is a breaking news edition of the Amanda Knox Acquittal. The report contains live footage of the judge’s verdict, capturing the flood of emotions that ensue after Amanda Knox and Raffaelo Sollecito have been cleared of the murder. Interviews with on-scene correspondents, Elizabeth Vargas and Josh Elliott, are featured towards the end of the segment, summarizing the reasons for the appeal’s success and proffering a first-hand account of the verdict and the public’s reactions. The creation of a special report to address the appeal demonstrates the centrality of the Amanda Knox case within the American media, with the ABC team promising full details on their website and in their World News nightly report. The news report demonstrates a unique reversal of the victim and villain roles referred to by Sacco, with the reporters’ commentary empathizing with the persecuted Knox and describing the hostile responses aimed at the Italian prosecutor Giuliano Mignini, who spearheaded the witch-hunt against Knox.  The ABC special edition is very well rounded, using live footage, ongoing host and on-site reporter commentary, identifying broader issues, such as the fact that the Italian justice system was also being tried by the public, and concluding on a sensitive note by reminding viewers to remember the victim and her family.

Photo of the Week

After watching page 1 which captures a year behind the scenes of what is arguable the world's most prestigious paper The New York Times, I thought I would include the following photograph taken by Irish photographer Seams Murphy. The image depicts the wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who is facing heavy legal and political ramifications for exposing thousands of classified United States secrets and documents online for public perusal. Julian Assange and repercussions of his actions have become a massive media phenomenon and the photo evokes the impression of a man who is under intense public and governmental scrutiny and who is the subject of persistent spotlight and inquiry. The blue glow cast over his face heightens the spectacle of the man and the story he embodies, holding the stoic Assange under its eerie and probing gaze. 

The Walking Dead Invade Brisbane

Last week Bruce mentioned one bloggers obsession with all thing zombie so I thought I would include one zombie themed entry as well. Over 8000 zombies were seen roaming across the Brisbane CBD district this Sunday in an effort to raise money and awareness for the Brain foundation. The annual zombie walk which began in 2004 with only 300 participants is rapidly gaining in popularity and continues to grow larger each successive year. Today's zombie walk blitzed the reigning world record held by the US city of Pittsburgh and their 4093 participants, with Brain Foundation officials declaring that they stopped counting at 8000. 

American Troops are Finally Coming home

American President Barak Obama announced last Friday that all US troops will be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of the Christmas holidays. The war in Iraq has been an obsession of the media since its outset nine years ago and this news has been long awaited by many American soldiers and their families. However, Obama's announcement has generated significant criticism and argument, especially by the Republicans, who have been supportive of the war and had hoped American would establish a permanent foothold in the unstable country. Obama's chief republican rival, Governor Mitt Romney, went as far to response that "The unavoidable question is whether this decision is the result of a naked political calculation or simply sheer ineptitude in negotiations with the Iraqi government." It is likely that Obama will continue to be both praised and assailed for his decision and whether the withdrawal will be carried out by the end of December as promised. 

Photo of the Week

I came across this photograph in a catalogue of World Press Photo Awards from 2006 and I thought that the aerial angle and almost visible vibrations of the shot were simply superb. The photograph depicts a rodeo bullring with a matador and the image resonated with scenes of bullfights Ernest Hemingway wrote about in his novel The Sun Also Rises. The novel was the first time I paid attention to the popularity and artistry of the spanish traditional sport and was able to see the power and grace behind the brutality of bullfighting. The image below is well balanced and almost abstract in appearance with a flaring of red in opposite corners and the horse and rider splayed outwards in an impossible fashion. The line of white lifts the picture to give it more dimension, adding gravity, movement and tension to the powerful scene. 

World's First Double Amputee Transplant Successful

I found the following article by Lauren Keiper very interesting as I have a fascination with medical breakthroughs and accomplishments and think that they deserve to go reported. Medicine allows man to emulate the gods and the successful transplantation of two hands to a quadruple amputee is an impressive story:

BOSTON (Reuters) - A 65-year-old quadruple amputee has received two new hands in a rare double transplant operation, Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital said on Friday.

Richard Mangino got the two hands last week in a 12-hour transplant procedure by a team of more than 40 doctors, nurses and other medical staff, the hospital said.

Mangino said he's adjusting to the new hands gradually and said now he won't have to "perform a miracle" every day to do simple things like make coffee and get dressed.

Speaking at a news conference seated in a wheel chair with his arms and hands propped on stack of pillows, Mangino said he prayed for the ability to touch his grandsons' faces, stroke their hair and teach them to throw a ball

Mangino, from Revere, Massachusetts, lost his arms below the elbows and legs below the knees after contracting sepsis, a bloodstream infection, in 2002.

The complicated surgery included transplanting skin, tendons, muscles, ligaments, bones and blood vessels on both forearms and hands, the hospital said.

Doctors said Mangino independently moved fingers just days after surgery and called the results a "resounding success."

His recovery will take many months and doctors expect him to regain sense of touch in six to nine months with ongoing therapy to help him learn to grasp and pick things up.

The double-hand transplant is the second performed by Brigham and Women's, a teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School.

In May, a team performed a full face transplant and its first double-hand transplant on Charla Nash, a Connecticut woman who was mauled by a chimpanzee in 2009.

The hospital said the hand transplant was successful, but the hands did not thrive after complications from pneumonia and were removed.

There are a few other programs around the country that perform hand transplants.

The first hand transplant was performed in France in 1998, and the first in the United States was completed a year later.

Doctors said about a dozen hand transplants have been done in the U.S. and believe just four of those have been bilateral.

Lecture on News Values

News values within journalism operate within a similar sphere to the principles of agenda setting. They refer to the degree of prominence that media outlets give to certain stories and the attention that is paid to them by audiences. It is hard to establish the cause and effect - whether it is the audience's interests that drive the type of stories covered by the media or whether it is the media that dictates which stories that viewers should be interested in.  News values depend on:

1. Impact - News that is interesting and that has the ability to grab attention.
2. Audience Identification - News that is interesting and relevant to the world. Audiences should be able to relate to what is happening and desire to know more about what is being shown.
3. Pragmatics - Principles such as ethics, facticity, practical current affairs and everyday concerns are an important component of news values.
4. Influence of the Source - The credibility of the source is important and journalism's relationship with public relations is also a relevant factor. PR can spin stories, control access to information and protect and shield clients. Sometimes this can happen at the expense of the truth and it is important not to be blind to this.  

Values are concerned with NEWSWORTHINESS and they differ from region to region and country to country. There are common threads of interest though, common tag lines that have become synonymous with news values include:

• If it Bleeds it Leads! - murder, shootings, accidents, trauma...the world is obsessed with the dark and twisted.
• If it's Local it Leads - people care about what is near and relevant to them. They care about what affects them.

A sense of news values should be intrinsic to journalists, as having the ability to identify what is newsworthy and what is interesting to the public is an incredibly useful quality. Good instincts can go a long way. 

Howard Evans (Editor of the Sunday Times from 1967 to 1981) believed that "A sense of news values is the first quality of editors - they are the human sieves of the torrent of news, even more important even than the ability to write or a command of language."

Many news corporations and journalists have attempted to establish common factors and news agendas within the media. The aim is to discover what news is worthy of a headline and what will garner the most attention. 

There are an infinite number of possible news values and these values are not universal. They differ within certain localities and countries and each they are subjective - different people will have different opinions over what is are the most prominent values.  

News values can include negativity, proximity, recency, currency, continuity, personality, predictability, elite nations or people, celebrity, exclusivity, magnitude, drama, visual attractiveness, entertainment, importance, controversy, unusualness and the emotional. 

Galtung and Ruge developed the following 3 Hypotheses that establish what is newsworthy and what is not (the hypotheses are essentially common sense):

1. The ADDITIVITY hypothesis that the more factors an event satisfies, the higher the probability that it becomes news.
2. The COMPLEMENTARITY hypothesis that the factors will tend to exclude each other.
3. The EXCLUSION hypothesis that events that satisfy none or very few factors will not become news. 

Some of the threats that complicate the perception of newsworthiness include the commercialisation of media and social life (too many platforms to keep track of and too much useless information), public relations (obscuring and subverting the truth) and how ideals of journalism that aim to address hard-hitting and serious issues are sacrificed for tabloidy trash.