Student Zone

According to the RedEye, WGN, and CBS, all covered a story about a string of robberies on the CTA Green Line ‘L.’ First reported was that only one 16-year-old teen was apprehended, and was said to be responsible for three of the twenty robberies that recurred around the Laramie, Pulaski, and Ridgeland stops. Later two more suspects were arrested in connection with their part in the robberies. Police said that no weapons were used in any of the attacks and robbers only used intimidation on their victims. The number of robberies is not a complete accuracy, because zero of the alleged attacks were reported in police's files. The only way police became aware of a “crime spree” was through a man contacting authorities by e-mail on August 23 to report he had been attack, according to the RedEye. Most victims felt no need to report the attacks because they felt they would not receive any of their belongings back, according to the RedEye.
The story covered in the RedEye, which seemed to be the only medium out of the three that did a follow-up to the robberies sought the importance of writing this article. I believe more airtime should have been given to such a report. Why? Due to the fact that 500,000 people in the Chicago area commute on CTA’s trains daily, according to CTA's website.
The RedEye publication is known for their lengthy pictures and light text, and is known for reaching out to the more urban crowd like those transporting on the CTA, especially younger readers. The RedEye wrote on the story in a column that offered a handful of safety tips from the CTA’s spokeswoman Robyn Ziegler to protect riders from future attacks and how to react in a situation that requires less franticness. “Don’t become too engrossed in a book, keep your shopping bag, backpack, packages or other belongings in your lap…” The RedEye focused on giving tips and telling the story in a matter that people would want to become involve, using the characteristic in a form of a superhero protecting train riders. Also, the story went a step further by confirming that more arrests were made in connection to the attacks and not just leaving the story as it used to be after becoming first published. Something about the news is that things are meant to change and updates are meant to be kept up with. However, the two television mediums that covered the stories only issued this report once as if it was not good enough to talk about a problem they were experiencing in front of consumers. Not saying that CTA's official were trying to divert the attention of consumers from being to familiar with this piece due to the price hike they were telling consumers to get ready for. How would that look to the public that they are increasing fare, but allowing their consumers to be robbed.
With two of televison news top broadcast shows being so brief and having a wider audience than it’s countepart the newspaper, I think that they should have put more emphasis on the report. Like in the summary, these teenagers allegedly had no weapons just their threats and intimidation. That should have sparked a controversy within itself about how today three teens can threatened to take out an adult. Leaving me to question why did they not say that police had found two more participants in the attacks on the Green Line, or how come they did not give tips on how to commute safely. To attract their audience the television simply held a poll on whether train riders would like to see more undercover cops or uniformed cops on patrol in light of this event.
A story like this would definitely touch more train and bus riders compared to those who have their own vehicles, but as reported by CTA there are 1.5 million commuters weekly and that should have constituted enough air time to this story about the danger on the Green Line. Whether through television or print this story needed not to be swept under the rug, but given more attention.

I would like to focus on the top five news stories of Fox news and ABC 7, on Thursday December 1,2005 for my second response. The first story on Fox was the story of Kyle Williams, a Purdue university student, accused of attacking two women on campus. This was followed by the story of a Loyola student being attacked in her home. The student was tied up with her phone cord, and her ATM card and laptop was stolen.
The third story was the TSA relaxing the restrictions of sharp objects on planes. The fourth story was the story of Chicago's expansion battle. The city was banned for trying to expand an airport over a cemetery. The fifth story was a boy killed by a hit and run accident while sledding in Blue Island.
ABC 7 Chicago's news lineup consisted of the first story being of a video game ruling, in which a judge ruled that the banning to sell explicit games violates free speech. The second story was the story of Kyle Williams attacking two Purdue students.
The third was the motive of the murderer of ISU student, Olamide Adeyooye, saying he killed her to get his name in the news. The Fourth story was 10 Marines killed in Iraq. The fifth was a Christian Peace group from Chicago kidnapped in the Middle East.
I believe the purpose of the Fox news lineup was to report more on campus safety. Also, to give the viewers a sense of a series of attacks on campus. I believe the attacks were important and people should know about them. However, if I was reporting, reporting that a boy was killed by a hit and run, would be reported first before the attacks.
I would have kept the TSA relaxing restrictions in the top five, because it is very important to the public, because relaxing restrictions could threaten their security on planes. The city being banned from expanding over a cemetery would not have even been in the top five. This story is important, but I believe only to the family and friends of the deceased in the cemetery, not to all of the general public.
I did not fully understand why the top story for ABC7 was the story of a video game ruling. Yes, this is a very controversial topic, but I do not believe any story on a ruling should go before women being attacked on campus. The only reason I believe ABC7 would put this story first, is to relieve people from watching stories on murder and attacks. The story of the boy being killed by a hit and run was not even reported.
The story of Olamide Adeyooye's murderer, killing her to be in the news, should not have supported his motive by actually putting it in the news, let alone in the top five news stories. This story, I would have replaced with the sledding accident. The story of the Marines being killed, and Christian peace group being kidnapped I would have kept in the same order.