Jason Sandford
Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.
An Asheville Citizen-Times headline on a big story this week has sparked the ire of some readers. Here’s what happened:
On Monday, Asheville police announced they’d charged 18-year-old Marcus Thorpe with first-degree murder and attempted murder in a shooting earlier this month at Hillcrest Apartments that left one man dead and a woman injured. The Citizen-Times reported the story thusly:
Asheville Police Department searches for murder suspect Marcus Austin Thorpe
City police are looking for a former Asheville High football player charged with first-degree murder in the shooting of a man at Hillcrest Apartments.
The injection of the phrase “a former Asheville High football player” into the top of the story caught some readers by surprise. Why does that fact rise to the level of being mentioned in the first sentence? The story notes that Thorpe was arrested on breaking and entering and drug charges when he was on the football team, but that was last year. Thorpe didn’t appear to be a star player, according to the account.
The story goes on to note that Thorpe was currently enrolled at Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College, so why didn’t the lead say that police were searching for an AB-Tech student?
Online commenters immediately jumped on the awkward inclusion of the football player fact, calling it senseless sensationalism. Some mocked the newspaper. Examples:
“Thorpe was a defensive back and running back for Asheville High before graduating in the spring”
So what? What does that have to do with anything. We’re all former somethings.
…
A recent multiple sex offender and pedophile who murdered two people in a drug deal gone bad was a regular Asheville Citizen-Times reader, authorities have confirmed. The culprit was said to be a regular reader of the local news section of the paper, and was reported to be particularly influenced by the education reporting of Ashley Wilson.
Authorities say that they have not yet found the link between this criminal’s sociopathic behavior and his affiliation with the Citizen-Times. The investigation is continuing.
On Tuesday, the newspaper had a follow-up story when Thorpe turned himself in to police. The newspaper stuck with inclusion of the “former football player” fact in the headline and story lead:
Former Asheville High football player Marcus Thorpe arrested on murder charge
A former Asheville High football player charged with murder in the shooting of a man at Hillcrest Apartments surrendered to authorities.
Once again, readers questioned the newspaper’s motives. One commenter left this note on the story. Clarke Morrison is a Citizen-Times reporter whose byline was on the Tuesday story:
Found in Thorpe’s pocket at his arraignment was a recent newspaper article by Clarke Morrison of the Asheville Citizen-Times.
Police have been unable at this time to determine what influence, if any, Mr. Morrison’s article may have had on the murders allegedly committed by Thorpe; however, Thorpe was reputed to be a regular reader of Mr. Morrison’s articles in the Citizen-Times.
So can anyone explain why the newspaper has reported this story in this way? Is it sensationalism? Is the newspaper out to get Asheville High School? Is there something else going on here that we don’t know?
It’s a misguided attempt to make the story more "local," a connection to the community in some way. With the way things are in newsrooms right now, it’s just that no one was around to catch it and question it.
I agree the football connection shouldn’t have been in the headline and my post was badly written on that score. I still think the "fame thing" makes sense in this context even if the fame is really small scale. To make the scale bigger, if the supsect had been a talk show host a few years back but was now an accountant, wouldn’t it make sense to say "former talk show host" at least somewhere in the article?
Anyway, this morning, I’m wondering whether the criticism here helped spur today’s warm & fuzzy piece on the current AVL high QB (like a ref’s make-up call). The QB sounds like a great kid and doesn’t deserve my sarcatic tone here – that’s for the grown-ups in the news biz. But I imagine there are lots of other kids doing community service in a bigger way. Sports hypes itself and gets hyped positively, so it can’t escape the negative.
I have to admit, when I heard of the case and the name of the suspect, I immediately remembered the guy played football at Asheville High. Unfortunately, there is a stigma which ends up attaching itself to current and past teams there just because of this mention. Not really deserved, either. If the suspect had been a former trumpet player in the marching band, would that reference have been made to identify him? I think just refering to the suspect by name, age and hometown would have been a better way to treat the story.
Steve, I respectufully disagree. Big time. The articles showed no reason for his high school to be mentioned. He’s in college now. (Or was.) So what he graduated from AHS? With him being a young black male in Asheville, it’s actually laudatory that he graduated from high school. Too bad he’s mixed up in this horrible mess, but what does that have to do with where he graduated? So f&**%n what?
There was no justification for making the connection in the HEADLINE and the LEAD that he went to AHS. He wasn’t a star on the football team.
They have a tacky new "crime page" with a bunch of mug shots now…maybe they need to add where these people went to school or which school they dropped out of.
Perhaps that would help us remember where we’ve heard of these people. Oh, that hooker went to Enka. I THOUGHT she looked familiar…
I am a sports fan, and am not an AC-T apologist, but I really think you guys are being awfully touchy.
I think they were just looking for the likeliest way the largest number of readers would have heard of the suspect and made a mild error for putting the football connection in the lead (if the kid were a star on the team, it might even belong in the headline). This is a small town at heart, and I don’t think I’m alone in scanning local articles as much to see acquaintances as news information.
There was no attempt to slur the football program or football in general (the NFL did a great job of that by trying to downplay its own study showing high rates of self-reporting of Alzheimer’s Disease in former players at alarmingly young ages).
I ain’t easy being a reporter at the AC-T these days. Let’s have a little sympathy and save the spears for real screw-ups. This one didn’t deserve a dart; maybe a splinter.
Maybe people who become journalists have an unfavorable memory of their own high school encounters with football players and are trying to get vengeance for the way they were mistreated by them by pointing out how many football players turn out to be jerks. (Which, I agree, is not news.)
The comment about Morrison was a joke and a dig at the paper, making a false connection between people who read the paper and crime, just like the paper making the connection to Asheville High with this kid. If it weren’t for crime, they’d have nothing on that web site. If you get a ticket for littering, watch out: "Asheville High grad cited for littering; attended Mars Hill College after graduation…"
Plainly put: its tabloid journalism (the CT at its best).
Again, the CTimes shows its bias and self-promotion. Big deal the guy had some article from in his pocket. Maybe it wasn’t the article but the ad on the back of the article he wanted. Maybe it was a coded message. Maybe it’s all a coincidence. Anything that the CT can do to promote itself in content seems to be the order of the day. I am a former reporter. The headline should read, "Former reporter catches Ctimes in shameless self-promotion."
Journalism 101 stick with the current facts. The fact that this person was a former football player does not enhance or explain the details of the story iin any way.
Have you checked the news on the Brevard College Football players over the last three years.
All felonies including counterfeiting money. I believe the news mentioned they played football as well.
It seems to be a trend with the Citizen-Times. Remember the big drug suspect roundup a few months ago in Madison County? Two of the suspects were indentified, throughout the coverage, as "Mars Hill College football players." The educational, athletic, and/or work backgrounds of none of the other suspects was mentioned. But that’s because it’s more sensational to make a connection between crime and athletes. Just doesn’t grab the reader as forcefully if you say, "14 drug suspects rounded up, including a plumber and a woman taking classes at AB Tech" or somesuch.