Crime Relevance

http://www.whas11.com/news/crimetracker/Change-231586121.html
http://www.whas11.com/news/crimetracker/Judge-orders-Robby-Albarado-to-get-new-trial-232070711.html
http://www.whas11.com/news/crimetracker/Louisville-woman-accused-of-using-rocks-to-break-into-ATM-machine-231595081.html

The stories listed above are examples of stories that ought not be covered by the local news station, WHAS. But that doesn't mean all crime stories are unsuitable for coverage, there is some crime that demands to be reported upon.

Based on the yardstick of newsworthiness. We can determine if a crime story is newsworthy if it is (but not limited to) one of the following:

• Someone whose identity is unknown is linked to a series of crimes. Like a string of murders or robberies that were likely committed by the same person. This affects a large amount of people until the criminal is caught, which puts civilians at danger.
• Someone that has committed a crime whose whereabouts are unknown. This affects everyone in an area until the person is caught for the aforementioned reasons.
• A kidnapping. It affects others in the community and it's a good way to get out the information and warn people to keep an eye open.
• If an important figure is killed. Sometimes this develops into another kind of story, like if it's a political figure it becomes a politics story.

If some obscure member of a community dies it isn't grounds for a story. It's a cop out (pun intended) all an outlet has to do is listen to the police scanner and send a truck to interview the person's family about how he or she was such a good person. This violates the journalistic yardstick of enterprise.