While on vacation earlier this month I was reading the free USA Today the hotel provided. I was appalled at the headlines concerning the Casey Anthony verdict. The “newspaper” was encouraging people to challenge the verdict by the jury. I am not sure whether it was deliberate or not, but the questions that USA Today articles covered assumed that the media is more important than our judicial system.
The articles made it seem that someone who read a few selected summaries of a reporter’s version of a long trial knew as much or more than the jury. Ask anyone who has sat on a jury — jurors take their job seriously. They based their decision on the merits of the case as presented by the prosecution. How dare a newspaper suggest that their coverage provides enough accurate, unbiased information to second guess the jurors! When asked an opinion about the verdict, an appropriate response is, “I don’t have an opinion. I wasn’t on the jury and I do not have enough information to form an intelligent opinion.”
The next case USA Today should cover is their trial for trying to subvert the American criminal justice system.
Gary McCaig
Lynnwood
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