Mark Obbie's Blog, page 30
April 25, 2014
Remember the children
The latest installment in a yearlong Dallas Morning News series on domestic violence, “Deadly Affection,” is this moving trio of stories of children who experience the murder of a parent. Reporter Diane Jennings deals effectively with the pain and confusion children face, for a lifetime, after witnessing such intimate violence. With such powerful characters, Jennings wisely doesn’t […]
April 21, 2014
Breaking good
Last week, I had the privilege of meeting and working with a remarkable woman who overcame terrible obstacles — a drug-infested, criminal upbringing, which led her to commit crimes as a juvenile — to change her own life and devote all her energy to helping other youth. Hers is a story of education, persistence, and […]
Pardoned to serve others
Last week, I had the privilege of meeting and working with a remarkable woman who overcame terrible obstacles — a drug-infested, criminal upbringing, which led her to commit crimes as a juvenile — to change her own life and devote all her energy to helping other youth. Hers is a story of education, persistence, and […]
April 20, 2014
Beautiful on the inside
Imagine the public outrage if the punishment were five years’ probation for a man who shoots his ex-wife in the face with a shotgun while she breastfeeds their child, blinding her and causing a lifetime of health challenges and disfiguration. Even though he claims it was an accident, our instincts for punishment and revenge kick in. We […]
April 18, 2014
A victim’s heartfelt words
One of the hardest things any of us must do is to listen to a point of view we disagree with — really listen to, and hear, the person who serves as an example of an idea that we oppose. It’s called having an open mind, and most of us aren’t very good at it. […]
April 17, 2014
Family time
After a crime or other tragedy, victims and survivors often experience for the first time what it feels like to be the subject of intense media curiosity. That can be an ugly, upsetting ordeal. Or, when handled with sensitivity and care, it can honor the victims by telling their stories in enough depth and detail […]
April 16, 2014
“Our good friends at the AP”
The New York Times has been accused in the past of churlishly refusing to share credit with competitors. It’s gotten somewhat more generous recently. Still, I was surprised at first that this lead story — on NYPD’s decision to shut down a controversial anti-terrorism unit that spied on Muslims — reached back to 2011 to give […]
April 13, 2014
From the book reviews
Recent reviews of notable journalistic narratives about crime and justice: In USA Today, Aamer Madhani calls two Boston Globe reporters’ book on the Boston Marathon bombings an exception to the rule that a first-anniversary narrative about a crime will feel like a rushed “notebook dump.” In Long Mile Home: Boston Under Attack, the City’s Courageous Recovery, […]
April 10, 2014
Who you calling gullible?
This is a story about the perils of jumping to conclusions and of taking what we read at face value. Times two. When R. Scott Moxley reported for OC Weekly on Monday about a California prison inmate’s unsuccessful challenge of his lengthy prison term and conviction on charges of molesting young girls, the story quickly […]
April 8, 2014
The case of the missing murders
This is what watchdog reporting, married with effective narrative storytelling, looks like: a blockbuster report in the May issue of Chicago magazine by David Bernstein and Noah Isackson documenting how Chicago police jacked their crime data to make the city’s decline in murders look better than it was. Even for those of us accustomed to […]
