Abstract

The potential for pretrial publicity to create or exaggerate anti-defendant bias in community members has been well-established. Aware of these biasing effects, organizations such as the American Bar Association and the U.S. Justice Department have provided guidelines for lawyers concerning types of information that should not be disseminated prior to trial. Media guidelines for police and prosecutors also exist in the Netherlands, but they differ somewhat from the U.S. guidelines. On the other hand, Korean criminal law contains a provision for media regulation which is purported to protect the defendant's fame in his/her community. Korean law does not recognize the possibility of bias caused by media and introduced into the court eventually to damage the fairness of the trial. Consequently, it is hypothesized that the nature of crime reporting is qualitatively different among the three countries. To test this, a comparative content analysis of crime reports in Korean, Dutch and U.S. newspapers was conducted. The content of text was coded to reflect the nature of the statement. Statements about defendants (suspects) and victims were coded. Types of statements included reports of demographic information, positive and negative characterizations, and statements made by the suspect or victim. An examination of over 2813 articles from the three countries revealed that media accounts of crimes are more a function of the intended purpose of legal provisions and social values attached to defendants and victims of the particular country rather than a function of the historical and philosophical tradition (civil v. commons law) of the legal system.