Back to Work, Week One

Winchester News Online has been sponsored by The Justice Gap this year, it is our role as the crime unit to write news reports weekly for the website, which plays host to many articles relating to the law and justice. I will keep you updated on the stories I am working on, by linking them through my blog. You will be able to view each article by clicking on the headline links.

Week One

During the Skype conference, the editor suggested several different current news ideas that we could write about. Personally I found the IPCC's statement regarding their satisfaction with the South Wales Police's investigation into police corruption over the Lynette White case the most interesting. It is an extremely high profile miscarriage of justice, which relates to my own personal interest within the legal system, therefore I was extremely engaged into researching this case. 

A phone interview was set up with the investigative journalist Satish Sekar, who worked closely on this case, to find out what he believed should come from these conclusions. The beauty of broadcast is that we can rely on the camera to get all our quotes down accurately, however with print I had to adjust to listening to the spoken quotes, and selectively writing these down whilst thinking about what question I wanted to discuss next. 

The editor suggested that I could of developed this article further by leading the article with Satish's comments. Our own quotes from the investigative journalist had the power to take the story on, I could of included a lot more coverage on what he had to say, and it shouldn't have been as low down in the article. This feedback taught me that we should always lead with the original source, that will attract human interest.

To view the article click the headline link below. 

IPCC sign off investigation into Cardiff Three Police corruption

Broadcast journalism is what WINOL specialises in, after delivering court reports weekly last semester it was something I became a lot more confident with, I built up contacts within Hampshire police and I was comfortable knowing what needed to be done. However, print journalism is something I have not had a great amount of experience doing, therefore this has been a challenge for me, and one that I am eager to practise and improve on. To be commissioned to write articles is the perfect opportunity for me to improve upon a personal weakness.

A week from now, the team will be down in London, we will be producing video interviews with David Jessel, Eddie Gilfoyle and Michael Mansfield QC. I have been preparing for the interview with human rights Barrister Michael Mansfield who has covered many high profile cases such as Birmingham 6, Hillsborough, Steven Lawrence, and more recently Mark Duggan, to name just a few.

Aside from working on The Justice Gap, the crime unit will continue to produce video reports for WINOL. I went down with the new crime reporters to Winchester Crown Court this week to take them through the stages of producing a report - from sitting in court, to passing the legal requirements through to obtaining convicted photographs and scripting for broadcast. 

This week Ian Anderson, the former editor of BBC 10 o'clock news was the guest editor. He was extremely impressed with the professionalism of the WINOL team. He gave individual feedback to all the reporters on their packages, and questioned the news editor on his running order of the stories. This was the first week back, and with some people producing packages for the first time there were some hiccups in terms of audio and camera work. Ian commented on how equally important it is to have good audio to match the visuals, begin with the best shots first, the first 20 seconds of your video need to be the most engaging, and give the viewer a reason to want to continue watching. 

I will be the news editor next week, my main goal is to ensure that all reporters focus on the quality of their output, they proved last week that the content can be superb so my main aim is to ensure the quality of the filming is up to scratch, paying close attention to the lighting, rule of thirds, and sound.