The Reporter I: Cops Killers and Crispy Critters
Published in the Media Studies Journal of the Freedom Forum Media Studies Center at Columbia University, this was an argument for a return to narrative as a means of humanizing crime coverage. I’d...
View ArticleMurder, I Wrote
From The New Republic, September 1997 Reprinted with permission. I used to cover crime on the late shift in Baltimore for The Sun. It was a living measured, by and large, in four-paragraph...
View ArticleTwo Americas: A primer for Europeans
On the heels of The Wire becoming a hot ticket on British television, The Guardian asked me for a curtain-raiser on season five — the media season — with a Baltimore dateline in their Sunday edition....
View ArticleA Municipal Moment Worthy of Orwell
Reprinted from the Baltimore City Paper February 25, 2009 (Image by MEL GUAPO) Police work, it is said, is only easy in a police state. So welcome to the city of Baltimore, where a police officer who...
View ArticleWelcome to Florida. Beware of gunmen standing their ground
From The Miami Herald, March 25, 2012 Reprinted with permission. Almost a quarter-century ago — in the halcyon days when human life was seen as more precious than property and people were regarded as...
View ArticleMr. Bealefeld’s Come-To-Jesus Moment
Embedded in a recently published interview of former Baltimore commissioner Fred Bealefeld is an extraordinary utterance — something that would and should be a lot more heralded if America were paying...
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