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Judging Crimes is a blog about criminal law, violent crime and the judiciary, dedicated to making the liberal case for greater democratic control of the criminal justice system.  It's a "view from the trenches" because it's written by a practitioner, not an academic or journalist.  It examines the changing role of the judiciary in American society by looking at what judges actually do, rather than what they say.  I know what they do because I deal with the consequences every day. 

Opinions issued by judges, from Supreme Court justices on down, are justifications for the exercise of governmental power.  But it is the exercise of power itself that should command our attention, not the justifications.  Judging Crimes is concerned with the reality of judicial power rather than the verbal formulas used to defend it. 

American law professors have long liked to say they teach their students "to think like a lawyer."  Learning to think that way is a matter of internalizing certain assumptions.  The practice of judging is likewise based on a foundation of shared assumptions, among them that the United States Constitution -- a document of 8,335 words, the length of a book chapter -- provides an answer to every question.  Rather like a Ouija board.

These assumptions are so ingrained -- and their internalization is so necessary to the successful practice of law -- that most people who subscribe to them aren't even aware of having done so.  Judging Crimes will try to engage not just with the expressions of judicial power, but with the assumptions on which those expressions  rest.  

Judging Crimes won't be filled with daily entries commenting on the day's events or provide a best-of-the-web welter of links.  Many other blogs already do that, far better than I could hope to do.  (Check out these.)  Instead, Judging Crimes will contain pieces of a length that might seem long for a blog but would be short in a serious magazine.  I hope to post new pieces several times a week.

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In Our Name
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« 386. Go figure | Main | 384. The cord is light »
Monday
Sep142009

385. Cold feet, hot type

Fox News reports that authorities have identified the body of Annie Le, the Yale graduate student who disappeared just days before her wedding.  On the same web page they offer a video: "Cold Feet or Foul Play?"  Hey, they just report.  You decide.

Everyone who lived in or visited Los Angeles over the summer will recognize a photograph of Lily Burk. Since June the LA Times has run 22 stories (including blog posts) mentioning her name, according to its search engine.  Her murder even made the National Law Journal, because Lily's mother is an adjunct law professor.

The Times, to its credit, also runs a Homicide Report, updated daily.  Most of the names in that list show up in the paper's search engine fewer than 22 times.  In fact, of the two I checked, neither showed up even once.

Here's how the list begins today (leaving out the black man killed by cops and the two little Latina girls apparently killed by their Jehovah's Witness mother):

Joaquin Madrigal, a 20-year-old Latino, was shot several times ...

Marcelino Pettway, a 25-year-old black man, died Tuesday, Sept. 1 after he was shot three times...

Rene Sandoval, a 22-year-old Latino, died Wednesday, Sept. 2 after he was shot twice...

Brenda Saxton, a 55-year-old black woman, died on Saturday, Sept. 5 after she was strangled...

Daisy Flores, a 26-year-old Latina, died Friday, Sept. 4 from complications related to a shooting eight years ago ...  Flores was shot in the spine in a gang-related shooting. The gunfire left her a quadriplegic...

Reynesha Reed, a 24-year-old black woman, died Monday, Sept. 7, after she was shot...

Jerome Downs, a 21-year-old black man, died Sunday Sept. 6 after he was shot...

Keith Moore, a 20-year-old black man, died Saturday, Sept. 5 after he was shot several times...

Scroll all the way down and you'll read about a 34-year-old white man beaten to death in Sunland (you know, near Tujunga), perhaps by someone driven mad by the fires.  Go back another week and you'll find two more occurrences of the word "white," although one of them refers to a Corolla.

Why is that that the murders of Lily Burk and Annie Le are news in the way these other murders aren't? That's not entirely a sarcastic question.  It's a way of asking: which came first, the callousness or the lack of media coverage?

AuthorJoel Jacobsen | Comment2 Comments | | |
DateMonday, September 14, 2009 at 09:07PM in

Reader Comments (2)

They are news because they are rare. Just like all other news. If you are looking for media bias, you are looking in the wrong place. This better falls into the category of voter ignorance as those _should_ know that blacks, latinos, and generally poor people are disproportionately affected by crime.
September 15, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterPrakhar Goel
Check out "Posts arranged by topic" and scroll down to the third topic from the bottom. Victim demographics is a frequent topic on this blog.
September 16, 2009 | Registered CommenterJoel Jacobsen

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