CANADA
CROSS-BORDER
GATEKEEPING
The trials of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka, provide an interesting case study of gatekeeping. The St. Catharines, Ontario, couple were convicted in the abduction and deaths of Kristen French of St. Catharines and Leslie Mahaffey of nearby Burlington. During the course of a regular shift, most reporters go about their duties as gatekeepers without much thought; it becomes second nature. However, reporters on this beat were made keenly aware of their role as gatekeepers and the power they held.
In 1993, at Karla Homolka's trial, Judge Francis Kovacs issued the following orders about how information relating to the trial was to be reported:
- Only accredited Canadian news media could attend the trial.
- The public was to be banned from the courtroom, with certain exceptions. No foreign media reporters were to be allowed in the courtroom.
- There would be a ban on publication of the circumstances of the murders, but certain procedural matters could be printed/broadcast.
The reason Kovacs gave for the ban was simple: To help ensure that Paul Bernardo received a fair trial. The ban proved to be problematic because much of the banned information was broadcast on American television and posted on the Internet in various newsgroups. But the role of Canadian journalists as gatekeepers was clearly defined; the gate had been locked. Journalists were only to report news that had been officially released by the court. Most journalists felt the ban was wrong because it interfered with the autonomy of their work and went against all the ideals Canadian journalism was based on, but most reporters complied.
While the ban became the topic of discussion surrounding Homolka's trial, it's interesting to note that for many journalists, having to deal with the lifting of the ban at Paul Bernardo's trial in 1995 proved to be a much more difficult task. Kirk Makin of the Globe and Mail described the Bernardo beat as, "a hyperactive little community, consumed by deadlines and a sense that we were involved in something big. Those of us who were together for the entire trial shared the camaraderie of veterans, if only because the things we heard and saw were often too searing to convey to friends and family. Particularly in the beginning, the mind was unwilling, the tongue unable."
At the start of the Bernardo trial, the publication ban on evidence given at the earlier Homolka trial was lifted and many journalists were pleased to at last be able to file reports. Ben Chin, reporter for CITY-TV in Toronto, expressed relief. "For two or three years now we've been carrying around these secrets, things we were prohibited from reporting. Now, all of a sudden we can, it's, kind of liberating."
While reporting the details of Homolka's trial might have been liberating, other factors made reporting difficult for the gatekeeper during the Bernardo trial. These factors included:
- The volume of evidence released, not only about Bernardo, but all the information and analysis surrounding Homolka's trial.
- The nature of the evidence itself which was graphically violent and sexual. How did one report such horrible acts?
Anne Marie Owens held a unique position as gatekeeper. A journalist for the St. Catharines Standard, she was the reporter assigned to the story when Kristen French was abducted in 1992 until the conviction of Paul Bernardo in 1995. Her experience on the Bernardo beat sheds some interesting light on the role of the gatekeeper. Most studies of the news-gathering process tend to state that news beats are highly routine. But these trials were anything but routine. Homolka's trial lasted only a few days. Owens describes it as orchestrated and neatly packaged. You were given the information and told what to report.
Bernardo's trial was different. In contrast to Homolka's trial, there was an abundance of information. Like Makin, Owens found the facts difficult to write about. Not only did she find the story repulsive, but she was also a reporter in a community that was trying to understand how something so horrible could happen in their hometown. The rapes and murders had shattered what sociologist Herbert Gans might refer to as the "small town pastoralism" of St. Catharines. Owens was also writing stories that might be read by the victims' families and friends. Owens remembers "listening to stuff that is sometimes unfathomable. The information that came out was so unlike anything else that the Standard normally covers. I had anticipated that there would be explicit information and details that would become, as gruesome as they were, relevant. There was so much awful information. Our job wasn't to give people all of it. It was to allow people to understand what had happened and give them enough details so they knew whit happened. That was tough."
Broadcasters also found it difficult to do their job. The readers can avoid the details in a story by not reading them, in broadcasting, once the words are spoken, they are heard by the audience. Van Alstine, news director for CKTB, a local St. Catharines radio station, remembers agonizing over newscasts. Paul Hunter of CBC News said he had difficult listening to and reporting the details of the murders knowing that the French and Mahaffey families were sitting not far from him in the courtroom. Even after editing the stories with graphic evidence, announcers would often preface a broadcast news story by saying that the content might be offensive to some.
Some people complained about the extensive coverage the media gave the trial, while others praised the media for their work. Most journalists would no doubt be sympathetic to members of their audience who took exception to the content of their stories. The details were horrific. But the journalists were only doing their job under unique and very trying circumstances.
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CANADA
DATABANK
Population
18.3 million
Literacy
100 percent
Television sets
1 per 2.2 people
Gross Domestic Production
$20,7200 per capita |
Adapted from The Media of Mass Communication, Canadian edition, by John Vivian and Peter Maurin (Allyn & Bacon Canada, 1997).
© 1999, by John Vivian, Route 1, Box 32, Lewiston, Minnesota USA 55987-9706 |
