Ex 5: Courtroom/Crime Reporting Refresher

Update, 2 Nov:

Was "Health/Sci Issue"

In preparation for an up coming court reporting lab, I have shifted the focus of this assignment.

More details to follow shortly.

Here are the details:

1. Individually, write a short news story that will appear in the next day's paper. Use only the sources that I provided for you today. About four or five paragraphs would be a good length.
2. You are a reporter at the local daily paper (not The Elizabethan), and you have been assigned to write a story on the Safe Streets, Safer Students club. Since Janet Marton is listed as the PR contact, you are starting with her. As a group, come up with three questions you plan to ask her.  For each question, imagine two ways that she might respond, and have a different follow-up for each possibility.
   
   
   1. Question 1
      
   • Possible Response 1 (and your follow-up in this case)
     
   • Possible Response 2 (and your follow-up in this case)
     
   2. Question 2
   • Possible Response 1 (and your follow-up in this case)
   • Possible Response 2 (and your follow-up in this case)
     
   3. Question 3
   • Possible Response 1 (and your follow-up in this case)
     
   • Possible Response 2 (and your follow-up in this case)

For Part 2, try to flesh these questions and answers out so that they make a narrative.

In other words, instead of "Ask her whether the jury will believe her, and if she gets upset, ask her what she plans to tell the judge,"  write out the exact words you plan to use, and  describe your source's response (and non-verbal actions, if relevant.) 

So you might ask your question this way:

I noticed in your September column, you mentioned how much you love peanut butter sandwiches, and I'm a little confused about that, since the lawsuit you filed against the dining services company says that you have a peanut allergy. As I understand it, when you dropped your phone behind the counter, a food service worker picked it up and handed it to you, and you got worried that it might have been contaminated with a peanut product, since the worker had just placed a peanut product on the steam table.  Do you think that the fact you published an essay referring to your love of peanut butter might make a jury doubt your claims that the incident put your health seriously at risk?

While you shouldn't publish subjective observations like "She shifted guiltily in her seat" or "She spoke each word as if her life depended on it," you might still keep notes to that effect for yourself. So feel free to include that kind of creative writing flourish in part 2 of this assignment.