Tuesday, December 27

reason not to date seriously #27

Woman Swallows Cell Phone After Argument A lovers' dispute over a cell phone took a serious turn early Friday morning when the woman ended the spat by swallowing the phone whole. Police said they received a call at 4:52 a.m. from a man who said his girlfriend was having trouble breathing. When they arrived at the house they found the 24-year-old woman had a cell phone lodged in her throat."He wanted the phone and she wouldn't give it to him, so she attempted to swallow it," Detective Sgt. Steve Decker of the Blue Springs Police Department. "She just put the entire phone in her mouth so he couldn't get it." Police said an ambulance transported the woman to St. Mary's Medical Center in Blue Springs. A hospital spokeswoman said she couldn't give details about the woman's health since police have not released her identity. Decker said police had closed investigations on the swallowing, the first such incident of its kind here."This is the first I've heard of this happening," said Decker. "I don't know what kind of phone it was. I don't know if it was on ring or vibrate, either." [CBS Strange News]

Real fvck!ng cute, Detective. A woman is asssaulted by her boyfriend---the most common cause of murders in this country is domestic disputes, so it's the #1 thing you should be looking for here---and you call the press, give them a "cute" one-liner, and add your own joke on to it. Here is the real story. Wonder why the police couldn't wait to close their investigation to get her side of the story first?

A woman who police thought had deliberately tried to swallow her cellphone during an argument with her boyfriend was apparently the victim of an assault instead, authorities in Blue Springs said. "It appears she didn't voluntarily swallow this phone," Kintz said. Police would not say whether the boyfriend was a suspect.

Early Friday, police responded to a call from a man who said his 24-year-old irlfriend was having trouble breathing. Police arrived to find a woman with a cellphone lodged in her throat. Police were initially told the boyfriend wanted the phone and the woman tried to swallow it so that he could not get it. [LA Times]

Um, yeah, dumbasses---who here could actually speak to the police to defend himself? Right: the attacker, not the victim, as is so often the case. But the police told their "cute" version news media, and here are all the cute leads they got to write for the original "story":

"Woman swallows cellphone playing "keep-away" from boyfriend" "Tactic Begs The Question, 'Mub Wou Ear Me Mow?'" "It was a conversation stopper." "We've all been there. Your spouse or loved one drives you to the breaking point, and you have no other choice than to swallow their cell phone."
This makes me wonder: Just how desperate are the news media to compete with blogs and other alternative mediums for news? And how much can we trust the big news stories, if the small ones are such gross fabrications?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I dunno if I'd cast the whole blame on the news media - generally, crime beat stories come after the police have filed their report, and are usually handled by very junior reporters (it's the next step up from the obits) who are going to be inclined to make nice with the cops so they can be assured access with other stories.

So the first fault came from the police themselves, the ones who are officially supposed to investigate. The second fault came from the reporter who swallowed (ahem) the cops' version of the story. I'm inclined to think the larger fault is the former.