Trying to define "complaint"

In "U.S. and Utah sue Scouts," a reporter for the Deseret Morning News wrote the following sentence:

The suits, which give one side of a legal argument, are seeking to cover the cost of fighting the fire and rehabilitating the land.

I am all for journalists enlightening their readers regarding the legal process, but this sentence caused me to pause. It seems what the reporter meant to define was the word "complaint," which Black's Law Dictionary says is "[t]he initial pleading that starts a civil action and states the basis for the court's jurisdiction, the basis for the plaintiff's claim, and the demand for relief."

You can see The Salt Lake Tribune coverage of the same story in "Boy Scouts sued over fire."

Sentence guidelines unconstitutional

Do you get the feeling that federal judges across the country (not to mention criminal defendants) were just waiting for a case like Blakeley v. Washington, decided by the Supreme Court last week? In Utah, it didn't take long for the case to have an immediate impact, as chronicled in The Salt Lake Tribune's "Utah federal judge: sentence guidelines unconstitutional" and Deseret Morning News' "Judge tosses federal guides."

Impressive!

All I can say about "BYU's anti-drug ads to make a big media splash" in today's Salt Lake Tribune is: very impressive!

Rushing to judgment

Ah, the joys of life as a journalist. Unlike judges, editorial writers don't have to consider arguments from both parties to a conflict before issuing their final opinion. The Salt Lake Tribune opposed the confirmation of Tom Griffith in this editorial, "Expired license." Actually, the headline is incorrect in that bar licenses don't expire. They can be revoked, and they can be suspended, including for non-payment of fees, but the clock does not tick on lawyers once they pass the bar.

Finally

The Salt Lake Tribune on Saturday finally caught up on the Jay Bybee story: "BYU graduate under fire for memo on torture use." No word from the Deseret Morning News yet on this.

Not a good day for BYU lawyers

In this house editorial, "A Nominee With No License," The New York Times urges the United States Senate not to confirm the nomination of Tom Griffith to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. In the same editorial, the Times holds up Ninth Circuit Judge Jay Bybee as an example of a judicial nominee who was confirmed too quickly. Bybee is a BYU Law graduate and Griffith is BYU's top lawyer.

Videoconferencing justice

"Asylum seekers tell it to camera, not judge", in today's Salt Lake Tribune, chronicles a very interesting development in immigration proceedings involving attorney J. Christopher Keen, a Watchdog friend.

Utah newspapers way behind

As I noted here, Utah newspaper reporters are way behind on the story of a BYU graduate involved in one of the biggest stories in Washington, D.C. The New York Times today covered the involvement of Ninth Circuit Judge Jay S. Bybee in the now-repudiated torture memos from the Office of Legal Counsel to the White House.

Tourist or missionary?

If further proof is needed that journalism is an inexact science, consider this example. Today's Deseret Morning News contains a story headlined "Missionary survives fall from cliff." The reporter wrote, in part:

A missionary for The Church of Jesus of Christ of Latter-day Saints was found alive in a deep canyon of an Australian national park, less than 24 hours after he reportedly fell from a cliff while looking for a lost shoe.

Meanwhile, the story was told somewhat differently in other newspapers. In my hometown Santa Barbara News-Press, for example, the wire version of the story was reprinted as "Tourist survives 230-foot plunge." That version said:

An American tourist was in a [sic] critical condition today after falling 230 feet into a canyon, officials said. The 21-year-old Texas man fell Wednesday from a lookout in Morton National Park in New South Wales. He had been walking with friends in the park and climbed over the lookout's safety barrier to retrive a shoe when he fell, ambulance officials said.

Bybee memos repudiated

The White House and Department of Justice yesterday repudiated memos on torture of terrorism suspects submitted under the authority of Jay S. Bybee, one-time Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel. Bybee has undergraduate and law degrees from BYU and now serves as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. As I detailed here, Utah news media have yet to cover this angle of the story.

Wrong spelling, late story

"D.C. court nominee lacks Utah law license" is a story The Salt Lake Tribune should have had a long time ago. Likewise the Deseret Morning News with its "Griffith's court nomination suffers a blow." Both papers are more than two weeks late on what should have been an obvious follow-up to earlier developments.

In the Trib's case, it is not only late but also wrong. The Trib misspelled the name of former BYU general counsel Eugene Bramhall.

Griffith did not have Utah bar license

The Washington Post has a story today entitled "Judicial Nominee Practiced Law Without License in Utah." Utah news media have not reported on this development yet, nor the one I detailed here.

Lock 'em up

The Salt Lake Tribune, in "Imprisoned Thinking," urges the State of Utah and Salt Lake County to open more jail space in time for the Fourth of July. I didn't know Utah criminals came out in spades for the nation's birthday, but an even more interesting revelation is that Utah's largest newspaper -- the one that "sets the standard for journalism" in the state -- is so tough on crime.

Bizarre murder case

I have not seen Utah news media cover the Contra Costa County, California, case that one newspaper called: "A nude model, five bodies and the Mormon assassination plot attempt." Other coverage is found here and here.

Journalists' private lives

Salt Lake Tribune columnist Holly Mullen revealed today she has married former Salt Lake Mayor Ted Wilson. She said she made the disclosure at the behest of her editors. I know a few newspaper reporters who are married to police officers, some of whom are fairly high profile. Should journalists be required to disclose personal information that might be perceived to affect their coverage of news?

Commentary on Bybee

A very interesting column in the Los Angeles Times this morning is entitled "Tout Torture, Get Promoted." I have yet to see the Utah news media cover this angle involving Ninth Circuit Judge Jay S. Bybee, a graduate of BYU's J. Reuben Clark Law School.

Is term "coed" outmoded?

The Deseret Morning News has a story this morning entitled "Is abduction linked to missing coed?" The term "coed" seems outdated, if not discriminatory.

Journalists and high society

We journalists sometimes like to dream we are part of society's elite. What I found most interesting about this story, Workman wedding -- media event?, in the Deseret Morning News, was not that a politician's daughter unknowingly sent wedding invitations to journalists but that a politician sees the need to send Christmas cards to journalists in the first place.

RM athletes

The Salt Lake Tribune published a story today entitled "Burgess is back, but will game be there?" that promises to be "[t]he first of an occasional series examining athletes' return to college athletics after an LDS Church mission."

I always advocate journalists being as transparent as possible, but I'm not sure why Trib editors felt compelled to include that explanatory line. Perhaps they felt the story itself was not obviously newsworthy. Maybe it would be better to hold these types of stories to run together as a package or an immediate series, rather than an occasional one. Still, I found the story interesting because it represented a different approach to covering a common phenomenon among Utah college athletes in particular.

Hatch, Griffith and "anti-Mormon bias"

The Hill has a very interesting article this morning entitled "Hatch fires back at his conservative critics." Conservatives are criticizing Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch for holding up judicial nominations in order to push through the nomination of Tom Griffith, BYU general counsel, for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. The critics say Hatch should not be favoring a "fellow Utah Mormon."

Hatch, meanwhile, charges the critics with anti-Mormon prejudice, something he says he has "dealt with . . . my entire life and during my time in the Senate as well."

The Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret Morning News have not covered this angle of the Griffith story. I have previously written about Griffith here, here, here, here and here.

Mack for President

So, Richard Mack is running for president of the United States. He already has one victory in the Supreme Court to his credit: Mack v. United States, No. 95-1503 (companion case to Printz v. United States, 521 U.S. 98 (1997)). I have a feeling Mack, one-time sheriff of Graham County, Arizona, will make good reality TV fodder for "American Candidate" on Showtime.

Searching for Mr. Right

This story in the Deseret Morning News was insightful and slightly humorous, but it too could have benefited from perhaps an additional source or two to demonstrate this phenomenon is widespread.

News media loves to report on itself

If one of the primary news values is conflict, then conflict involving another news organization is even better. This story in the Salt Lake Tribune is an example of a frequent phenomenon -- journalists writing about other journalists involved in some kind of spat. It's difficult to say whether news consumers are as interested as journalists in the internal machinations of the news business and the resulting conflict between news organizations and their sources or subjects.

Half the story

Perhaps no judges would comment publicly on Utah's Judicial Conduct Commission, but this rather one-sided, two-source story in the Salt Lake Tribune lacks the balance that some additional sources -- especially judges -- would have provided.

Tooting their own horns

Ever notice that The Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret Morning News often cover the same story in completely different ways? Here's an example: This story would have you believe the Tribune cleaned up in the Utah-Idaho-Spokane Associated Press Association contest. Meanwhile, this story clearly concludes the News prevailed. Who's right?

Two for two

As I predicted yesterday, The Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret Morning News are catching up this morning here and here on Tom Griffith's failure to pay bar dues.

No dues for Griffith

Today's Washington Post contains a story detailing that Thomas B. Griffith, D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals nominee and BYU general counsel, did not pay bar dues in Washington, D.C. for three years. I haven't seen this in the Utah news media yet.

Maybe the Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret Morning News will follow with the story tomorrow. No telling how this bar dues flap will affect the "Senate family" treatment Griffith was due, according to Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, as detailed here.

TV news wars

This very interesting story in The Salt Lake Tribune reveals that KUTV (Ch. 2) has closed the gap on KSL-TV (Ch. 5) in terms of attracting viewers to its 10 p.m. newscast. The most revealing part of the story, however, deals with the pointed criticisms of KUTV by KTVX (Ch. 4) news director Jon Fischer, who called KUTV news a "dog and pony show" and then said:

It's a disservice to the public, when you have a news program and you don't deliver news and you take something and try and disguise it as beneficial. Is it a newscast or a reality show?

Are those sour grapes from the fourth-place TV news program (KTVX also trails KSTU (Ch. 13)) or does he have a point that could be applied to virtually all TV news, especially during ratings sweeps?

Sports and GRAMA

It's nice to see that even sports reporters know how to use Utah's Government Records Access Management Act. In this story in today's Salt Lake Tribune, the reporter obtained Utah football coach Urban Meyer's new contract through a GRAMA request. On a somewhat unrelated note, though, I am confused as to whether Michael C. Lewis is a reporter or columnist. Should a journalist be allowed to write hard news and columns at the same time, or does that blur the line?

Clearly erroneous

This story in today's Deseret Morning News contains several errors and awkward passages. The second paragraph reads:

Attorney Brian Barnard plans to file an immediate appeal of U.S. District Judge Bruce Jenkins' recent ruling affirming the Circuit Court's 1973 decision and dismissing his client's challenge of the public display of a Ten Commandments monument in Pleasant Grove.

It is axiomatic that a U.S. District Court does not "affirm" decisions of a U.S. Court of Appeals. The Court of Appeals could, however, affirm a District Court decision. A District Court is bound to follow earlier Court of Appeals decisions because that is the distinguishing feature of our common-law system's emphasis on precedent. Finally, I have never heard of the "equal treatment" clause in the Constitution, although the Fourteenth Amendment does have an equal protection clause.

Provo Angels Double A?

This story in today's Salt Lake Tribune contains a quote from Utah Higher Education Commissioner Richard Kendell calling the Provo Angels a "Double-A" team. Last time I checked the Angels were a rookie-league team, and that's a far cry from Double A. Should the reporter or copy editors have pointed out Kendell's error?

Repetitive stories

Good morning, and I hope everyone had a wonderful Memorial Day! This morning's Salt Lake Tribune includes a story entitled "Heck with critics, Provo's proud" that I found to be highly redundant in light of an almost identical story just one week ago entitled "Business types not flocking to Provo" (subscription required). Am I missing something?