Reporters who parrot corporate claims of out-of-control theft play into a narrative that benefits big business and perpetuates carceral policies.
White voices and victims dominate the genre, which can skew the perception of what constitutes a crime.
In two articles, the Times asserts a ‘spike’ in crime since the passage of bail reform in New York, an increase that the articles themselves note they can’t prove.
Media coverage obsessively focuses on homicides, which are at historical lows. Meanwhile, suicides and overdoses skyrocket, quietly driving record declines in American life expectancy.
Murder rates are at an all-time low in Brooklyn, but one would hardly know it reading the New York Times.
The New York Times’s coverage of the one-off case of a 77-year-old man omits key facts about how older adults are treated by our punitive legal system.