Legal proceedings, media, and mental illness - IJCACJ 38(4) (original) (raw)

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International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice

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Legal narratives as significant news sources about mental illness and violent crime

Meron Wondemaghen a{ }^{a}
a{ }^{a} School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
Published online: 18 Oct 2013.

To cite this article: Meron Wondemaghen, International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice (2013): Legal narratives as significant news sources about mental illness and violent crime, International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice, DOI: 10.1080/ 01924036.2013.848219

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Legal narratives as significant news sources about mental illness and violent crime

Meron Wondemaghen*

School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia

Abstract

Media coverage about people affected by mental illness is an area of research that is extensively examined. Many scholars argue that the media depicts people with mental illness as inherently violent and dangerous within sensational narratives. These depictions are criticized for reinforcing the social stigma and disadvantages many of the mentally ill face. The media does, however, require news sources and, in the context of crime and mental illness, the courts are a significant source. Through qualitative content analysis of Australian newspaper articles, this research examines an under-researched and incompletely theorized area. In doing so, it demonstrates that media depictions of some mentally ill offenders reflect and heavily draw upon legal narratives and what is argued in court about these offenders in the context of criminal responsibility and legal insanity.

Keywords: mental illness; violence; crime; media; courts

1. Introduction

There is little research to date about how legal conceptualizations and narratives of mental illness and violent crime affect media narratives of this subject, and in which dominant news frames mentally ill violent offenders are portrayed following their legal proceedings. What is well documented is the media’s portrayal of people with mental illness as being overwhelmingly negative: the mentally ill are depicted as inherently violent and dangerous in sensational narratives. Hazelton (1997) identified the portrayal of people with a mental illness in the Australian media within various dominant interpretative frames, including “the bizarre,” “moral tales,” “medical marvels,” and especially “dangerous to others.” Similarly, Blood, Putnis, and Pirkis (2002) in a study of Australian print and broadcast news media showed how editors and journalists used news frames of violence, deviance, risk, and fear to report stories of mental illness. Although these stories were about relatively rare circumstances of violence, Blood et al. argue they were generalized to “everyone” with mental illness and, more importantly, failed to report that most of the mentally ill are often victims of crime rather than perpetrators. Audiences then draw from these frames of violence, which lead them to fear the mentally ill as a high crime risk group for the community.

Similar findings have also been reported internationally. Content analysis of six different North American newspapers covering the issue of mental illness conducted by Wahl, Wood, and Richards (2002) showed that dangerousness was the most common theme

in all the papers. If violence was not mentioned, the next common theme was the disabling nature of the illness with positive stories being nonexistent or outnumbered by negative themes. Day and Page (1986) argue that newspapers in Canada covering mental health issues attributed dangerousness and unpredictability as the most common traits of people with a mental illness. In the UK, two-thirds of newspapers consider “violence towards others” as a trait of having a mental illness, labeling those affected as “mad,” “maniac,” and “psycho” (Philo et al., 1994). Furthermore, the New Zealand Mental Health Commission (2000) reported that one in five newspapers mentioned violent behavior when reporting stories related to mental health issues. Even fictional characters depicted on television as having a mental illness are portrayed as aggressive, violent, and unpredictable (Coverdale, Nairn, & Claasen, 2002). At odds with existing research, however, Australian scholars report that stories of mental health and crime were uncommon in Australia, representing only 5.6%5.6 \% of all coverage (Francis et al., 2004). They suggest this may be due to changes in the trend in the press toward positive media coverage of the mentally ill or a much higher awareness and attention to mental health issues. The terms “mental illness” and “violence” seem to be used as general terms, either not specifying which illnesses or behaviors are discussed, or using one type of illness and behavior under the general terms of “mental illness” and “violence.” In a review of the literature, Douglas, Guy, and Hart (2009) argue that numerous studies discussing violent behavior by mentally ill offenders “still decline” to define violence; many researchers define violent behavior on a continuum ranging from minor physical acts such as pushing, damaging property, verbal threats to harm someone, any physical acts that might cause harm, to extreme cases like homicide. In any case, associating the mentally ill (in general) with violence and unpredictability makes these news stories appealing to the public because they contain heightened elements of newsworthiness: “stranger danger,” irrationality, and deviance.

Considering the relevance of mental disorder in the context of crime and criminal responsibility is a legal question. This article seeks to provide insight into how the media interprets and frames the issue of psychiatric disorder and violence from court proceedings of mentally ill offenders. It is important to examine the courts 1{ }^{1} as significant sources about this topic because, generally, journalists require and interact with “powerful” or “elite” news sources when bringing information to audiences (DeVrese, 2005; Hall, Critcher, Jefferson, Clark, & Roberts, 1978; Nelson, Crawson, & Oxley, 1997). They rely on “elite sources for quotes, insight, analysis and information” before reporting a story within summarized journalistic frames (Nelson et al., 1997). The media does not itself “autonomously create news; rather [it is] cued in to specific news topics by regular and reliable institutional sources” such as the courts 2{ }^{2} (Hall et al., 1978, p. 57).

Thus, though the issue of “mental illness” in the context of violence can appear in the press from various news sources, depending on the case and the sociocultural atmosphere around the case, this article provides insight into a neglected area in the analyses of media representations of “mental illness” as causing violent crime. It utilizes qualitative content analysis of newspapers and applies news framing theory to explore what media narratives emerge in the Australian print press when the courts and their legal narratives are the news sources about violent offenders with mental illness. Because the focus is on the emerging media narratives following legal proceedings, the relevant legal concepts and principles will only be briefly examined. The findings will be applicable to the international context considering the existing wealth of literature on this topic based on newspaper content analysis and news framing theory (explained in Section 3). In addition, this research is applicable to all commonwealth and liberal democratic societies with similar legal systems that use the insanity defense based on the M’Naghten rule, when examining the significance of

legal narratives and concepts as news sources about mental illness and violent crime. It is important to note that the Commonwealth Criminal Code Act (1995) - which was formalized to serve as a model for all Australian jurisdictions - includes a volitional component to form the basis for legal insanity in addition to the cognitive-based M’Naghten elements. Though the cases examined in this study are from a jurisdiction that does not recognize this volitional component, the findings can also be relevant to jurisdictions that rely on the volitional test of the defense, in terms of media and journalistic interpretations, and commonsense understandings about madness, violence, and legal insanity.

2. Definitions of mental illness

What is important to consider is that mental illness has various definitions. In the medical field, because the purpose is treatment, clinical definitions are broad in order to accommodate a range of diagnoses to enable treatment. In contrast, courts aim to determine if an individual is criminally responsible or not, leading to narrower legal definitions. In the clinical context, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition (DSM-IV), published by the American Psychiatric Association, defines “mental disorder” as a “clinically significant behavioral or psychological syndrome or pattern in an individual, associated with present distress or disability,” that cannot be “an expectable response to a particular event, such as death of a loved one” and must be considered a “manifestation of a behavioral, psychological or biological dysfunction in the person” (APA, 1994, p. xxi). Mental illnesses can further be classified into psychotic and non-psychotic based on patients’ ability to make sense of reality. Psychotic disorders are mainly characterized by delusions and prominent hallucinations (APA, 1994, pp. 273, 275); patients lose touch with reality and are unable to make sense of thoughts, feelings, and the external environment.

Legally, mental illness is defined as “an underlying pathological infirmity of the mind” by the Commonwealth Criminal Code Act (1995). In the context of crime, it can be relevant when raising the defense of “mental impairment.” Mental impairment 3{ }^{3} - which is a legal term that refers to legal insanity rather than a medical condition - can be considered at two distinct stages of the legal system. It can be considered before trial, in terms of whether the offender is fit to be tried (or fit to plead), and can be raised during trial, in relation to the time at which the offense was committed. Mental illness, on the other hand, can be relevant after trial and during sentencing considerations because the law recognizes an offender’s mental health state at the time of sentencing regardless of culpability. The courts rely heavily on psychiatric expert opinion about an offender’s mental state at the time of an alleged offense if mental impairment is an issue at trial. The defense is employed to determine whether an offender knew the nature and quality or wrongness of an act such that he or she is criminally irresponsible. Knowing the “nature and quality” of the conduct refers to the physical element of the act or the estimation and understanding of the consequences of the act; for example, having the capacity to know and understand the significance of killing (Bronitt & McSherry, 2010, pp. 245-247). Under s7.3(1)b of the 1995 Criminal Code Act, not knowing the conduct was wrong means that “he or she could not reason with a moderate degree of sense and composure about whether the conduct, as perceived by reasonable people, was wrong.” Section 7.3(1)c of this Act also includes a volitional component: the person was unable to control his or her conduct. The legal definition in relation to the ability to reason about right and wrong is irrelevant to the diagnosis of psychiatric behavior in the medical field because mental health professionals look for psychological causation (Victorian Law Reform Commission, 2003). This medico-legal discrepancy in how “mental illness” is conceptualized is reflected in the small number of cases in which

the defense is successful; namely cases in which offenders suffer from the psychotic-type mental illness (Victorian Law Reform Commission, 2003, pp. 177, 181). Because psychotic offenders lose touch with reality, they appear to be more readily accepted by the courts and juries as having lost the ability to know the nature and quality or wrongness of an act. Non-psychotic mental illnesses such as depression are not considered to reach the threshold for the defense such that these offenders did not know the nature and quality or wrongness of an act, due to the intact reality testing, high prevalence, and familiarity of depressive illnesses (Wondemaghen, in press).

Reporters must then “make sense” of such definitions and report news stories involving mentally ill offenders within summarized journalistic interpretations. Media reports draw heavily on readily available sources and texts - such as legal texts, counsels’ arguments, and judges’ remarks, all seen as “authorized knowers” - and produce news reports that become texts within a different genre again, from rewritten and reworked preexisting texts (Naylor, 2001). In doing so, the media can “manufacture” reality by constructing news themes that draw on commonly understood narratives (Hall et al., 1978; Tuchman, 1978) because the meaning of messages depends on the current sociocultural atmosphere, social group behaviors, and the interpretation by audience members (Driedger & Eyles, 2001). That is, the media communicates information to audiences through framing.

3. News framing theory

News framing occurs through the dynamic process of communication involving frame building and frame setting (DeVrese, 2005). Frame building refers to themes that emerge from the text; frame setting is the interplay between media frames and audience predispositions of an issue. Frames work by highlighting some parts of information in the subject of a text, making it more noticeable, meaningful, and memorable to audiences through placement and repetition (Entman, 1993). To frame is to “to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text” (Entman, 1993, p. 52); a process of removing some elements of a story whilst constructing a narrative that highlights and promotes a specific interpretation (Entman, 2007). But even in obscure parts of a text, information can be highly prominent “if it comports with the existing schemata” in the audience’s beliefs (Entman, 1993, p. 53). And as such, even if a concept is emphasized in a text, it can be difficult for audiences to successfully remember it because of their existing schemata. Schemata are mentally stored ideas - such as stereotypes - that guide an individual’s memory and processing of information (Donsbach, 2004; Entman, 1993). Because prominence is the product of the interaction between the communicator (text) and the receiver (audience), the presence of a particular frame in a text does not necessarily influence audience perceptions unless there is an existing schemata of that frame. For example, media association of violence and mental illness does not create the perception that the mentally ill are “dangerous others” unless this perception previously existed in the schemata of readers. It is within these “familiar” and commonly understood narratives, then, that the media frames stories.

Regardless of audiences’ existing schemata, however, framing has the power to influence perception when some aspects of reality are selected and highlighted whilst others omitted. This is illustrated in an experiment by Kahneman and Tversky (1984), in which there is a systematic change in preference when the same issue is presented differently. Although framing does not have a universal effect in influencing audiences’ thinking, it does have a significant effect on the majority of the receiving audience in terms of what is noticed and remembered (Entman, 1993). When some aspects of reality are highlighted in a text whilst others are absent, attention is essentially directed away from the omitted parts

(Edelman, 1993, p. 232; Entman, 1993). In this way, the media has the power to direct its audience to which issues are of concern and which are not, simply through inclusion and exclusion of concepts or interpretations, by framing. Though people can make their own judgments and recall their own memories for reasoning or ways of thinking that are not present in the text, framing can make a significant influence on interpretation and perception because on matters of social interest, such as mental illness and violence, the general public is usually not so well informed. Thus, news, as a sociocultural product, reflects what is deemed newsworthy or valuable to report, and as such gives insight into the social organization of journalistic and newsroom routines as well as the assumptions made about what audiences want and will be receptive to (Tuchman, 1978, p. 46).

4. Methodology

This article employed qualitative content analysis of newspapers to determine the process of news framing in the selected cases. Three high-profile court cases of violent, mentally ill offenders that received prominent media coverage were selected. All cases were from Victoria, Australia. 4{ }^{4} The retrospective selection of the most high profile cases with completed trial proceedings allows for examination of various news themes during the span of the legal process. The cases were obtained from the Library database for newspapers, Factiva Dow Jones. They were selected to demonstrate in which dominant news frames these offenders and their behaviors were portrayed, and which news frames were derived from legal proceedings (at the Supreme Court) as a news source. Cases were limited from 1997 onwards because Victoria developed and passed its own legislation dealing with “mental impairment” in 1997; the Crimes (Mental Impairment and Unfitness to Plead) Act (CMIA). A database search for “mental impairment” from 1 January 1997 to 31 December 2011 on Factiva Dow Jones yielded 308 articles (with 21 duplicates) that addressed “mental impairment” in general. From these, those covering homicide cases were selected because this article considers homicide as an example of serious violence. In addition, the defense of mental impairment tends to, almost exclusively, be raised for offenders involved in homicide due to the possibility of indefinite detention at psychiatric facilities if found “not guilty because of mental impairment.” That is, it is in an offender’s best interest to plead guilty for a relatively shorter sentence and detention if involved in less serious crimes. Once cases of homicide and mental impairment were identified, a separate search for the full name of the offender from each case was conducted on Factiva. The most high profile cases from Victoria were selected (see Table 1).

The cases were the Arthur Freeman, Donna Fitchett, and Huan Xiang cases. The most prominent coverage in the selected time period was given to the Freeman case, search for which retrieved 137 articles (with 33 duplicates). This was 44%44 \% of the total number of articles that mentioned “mental impairment.” The Fitchett case was the second most prominent case, yielding 69 articles (nine duplicates), with 22%22 \% of the total number of articles. Searches for the Xiang case resulted in retrieval of 57 articles, making it the third most prominent story, with 18.5%18.5 \% of the total number of articles. The three major newspapers in Victoria were selected for analysis. They are the Herald Sun (HS, tabloid), The Age (TA, broadsheet) and one of Australia’s two 5{ }^{5} national daily newspapers, The Australian ( AUSA U S, broadsheet). In addition to covering the cases extensively, these newspapers were selected because they have a high circulation and reflect different political orientations, thus providing various perspectives. HSH S and AUSA U S are right-wing papers while TAT A is center-left. Figures 1-3 show the press coverage of the three cases. The number of articles in these three newspapers covering the case studies is 126 for the Freeman case, 66 for the Fitchett case, and 49 for the Xiang case.

Figure 1. Number of articles covering the Freeman case.

Figure 2. Number of articles covering the Fitchett case.

Figure 3. Number of articles covering the Xiang case.

Table 1. Cases were selected from Victoria to examine the mental impairment defense in this jurisdiction, as it is the only Australian state that does not define the mental states that form the basis for the defense. It also does not recognize the partial defense of diminished responsibility. Significant differences are shown in the number of newspaper articles covering the first five cases from the remaining 23. The Gabriel case from Queensland (where diminished responsibility is recognized) and the 1970 Percy case (on Factiva search results because it was still reported at the time this research was conducted as new evidence was emerging) were not considered because these cases were limited to Victoria from 1997, which is when the CMIA was passed.

Articles that were not directly related to these offenders but had mentioned them in similar stories of violence or used their stories as examples of other issues, were not included in the sample. In addition, duplicate articles were considered as one due to the identical or similar content in both. As such, the final sampling was as follows: Freeman (n=78)(n=78), Fitchett (n=52)(n=52), and Xiang (n=43)(n=43). Legal proceedings were analyzed from R v Freeman, 2011; R v Fitchett, 2008 and 2010; and R v Xiang, 2004 transcripts, respectively.

In addition to their prominence, these cases were fitting for examining elements of newsworthiness and sensationalism that were due to the sociocultural and political factors at the time rather than the “mental illness” element of cases involving violent mentally ill offenders. The Freeman and Fitchett cases involved the killing of children following marital disputes; Freeman had killed his daughter and Fitchett her two sons. Culturally deviant cases such as these, where the victims are the defendants’ children, challenge the social expectations about the capabilities and responsibilities of parents, and the values of the institution of family. These crimes are appealing and newsworthy because they evoke

confronting feelings in the public. Similarly, the Xiang case, in which the offender shot two university classmates due to persecutory delusions, had elements of newsworthiness that were not associated with the issue of “mental illness” in the context of violence. The nature of this crime shocked people’s expectations about safe places such as universities and schools. The press portrayed the case as a type of crime that can affect “any of us” or “our children” could be victims because it occurred during state and federal election times and certain international circumstances of violence. As will be explored in greater detail shortly, these three cases were prominent because they were framed within “familiar” and newsworthy elements such as “we could all be victims”; highlighted “stranger-danger”; had spatial and cultural proximity, violence, and spectacle; and children as victims (Jewkes, 2004, pp. 40-55). The issue of “mental illness and violence” was not reported until the relevant legal proceedings commenced. These cases were, thus, suitable for illustrating that (i) prominence of news stories involving mentally ill offenders depends on the current sociocultural and political atmosphere, rather than a unique focus on the issue of “mental illness”; (ii) media coverage of mental illness in the context of violence is significantly influenced by legal concepts and narratives because the issue of whether a mental disorder is linked to violent crime is a legal question.

When analyzing newspapers, the author used a linguistic approach whereby news frames are identified by analyzing the selection, placement, and structure of specific words and sentences in a text (Entman, 1993; Esser & D’Angelo, 2003; Pan & Kosicki, 1993), making a paragraph a unit of analysis rather than considering the whole article as a unit. This idea is based on the notion that specific words are the building blocks of frames (Entman, 1993), which clearly outline the linguistic elements that signify a frame and which can be measured for syntax, script, theme, and rhetoric (Pan & Kosicki, 1993). The major advantage of this approach is that it allows for a systematic and thorough analysis of news texts (Matthes & Kohring, 2008) with low subjectivity. Despite some criticisms that content/text analysis cannot offer insight into the context of news production in media organizations or audiences’ perceptions and reactions (Philo, 2007), it has become an accepted and effective method of reflecting journalistic practices and ideologies because “despite many advantages of large-scale research projects that integrate moments of production, content and reception, only independent textual analysis can elucidate the narrative structure, symbolic arrangements and ideological potential of media content” (Fürsich, 2009, p. 239). In text analysis, researchers should “start with the text and/or textualizations and see where they take them, rather than starting with some judgments and then searching out evidence to support them” (Van De Berg, Wenner, & Gronbeck, 1998, p. 299), as would be the case in the approach suggested by Philo (2007). Beyond the manifest content, text analysis focuses on the “underlying ideological and cultural assumptions of the text” in media narratives (Fürsich, 2009, p. 240) and goes beyond producers’ or audiences’ intentions. Using semiotic, narrative, genre, or rhetorical approaches, text analysis allows for a “strategic selection and presentation of analyzed text as the evidence for the overall argument,” moving beyond manifest content to identify latent meaning, implicit arguments, assumptions, omissions, and broader contexts in a text (Fürsich, 2009, pp. 240-241).

In this study, the author grouped frame elements (themes, script, rhetoric) in an article together in a systematic way, forming patterns, ensuring themes emerged “naturally,” so that unanticipated themes emerge and no priority is given to preconceived or “expected” themes. When these patterns occur multiple times within an article or in several articles, they are interpreted as news frames. The benefit in taking this systematic linguistic approach, rather than the coding of each article or groups of articles, is that it allows for an

interpretative rather than a mechanical approach. That is, it allows the author to determine meaning and context in light of the questions asked.

To add further insight about news values and newsroom routines when reporting stories of violence and mental illness, interviews with three crime reporters were conducted. Participants were selected based on their experience; these reporters had covered many stories of violence and of mentally ill offenders as well as the selected case studies. Both the participants’ experience in their professional roles and their involvement in the selected case studies allow for a range of responses that are both general and specific to the cases and the research question. They agreed to be identified by name. They are Ms. Shelly Hadfield (HS), Ms. Andrea Petrie (TA), and Mr. James Madden (AUS). Initial questions were semistructured to encourage interviewees to respond with their own ideas and discuss their experiences and opinions. Probing questions were asked during the same interview, after identification of key themes from the initial questions.

5. The portrayal of violent mentally ill offenders

The following sections examine the dominant news frames in which the selected cases were reported, and illustrate the emergence of news frames about “mental illness” in the context of violence only following legal proceedings.

5.1. Case study 1 - Huan Xiang

Huan Xiang shot two university classmates and injured five others on 21 October 2002, because he believed the students he ultimately killed were going to kill him. He had felt socially isolated and deliberately excluded from students’ activities. Both the prosecution and the defense established that the offender suffered from a delusional paranoid disorder as to be mentally impaired (legally insane) during the crime, and urged the jury to reach a “not guilty because of mental impairment” verdict. The jury reached this verdict. In 2004, he was given a disposition of 25 years in a psychiatric hospital. Before trial, this case was a firearm-related social problem. Once the case went to court, it was a mental health issue, a failure in the mental health system and in the university’s ability to provide appropriate mental health and support services.

5.1.1. News frames before court proceedings

Immediately after Xiang’s arrest, narratives of an “uninterested,” “emotionless,” and therefore remorseless, killer emerged because posture and facial expressions have social significance and can be interpreted by readers (Goffman, 1959). Using descriptions given by students who knew Xiang as news sources, he was the “frustrated loner”:

Often frustrated in tutorials because no one could understand him. (“Man held over Uni killings” TA 22 October 2002: 1)

He remained silent . . . but occasionally nodding. (“Accused stays silent” HS 23 October 2002: 5)

Accused gunman an isolated loner. (AUS 26 October 2002: 4)
Homicidal shootings involving multiple victims, as seen in this case, are often thought of as a gun problem (Fox & Levin, 2005) or a mental health problem (Aitken, Oosthuizen,

Emsley, & Seedat, 2008). Before trial, the Xiang case was largely framed as a firearm problem rather than a mental health issue because of political tensions that were heightened by state and federal elections at the time. These frames were constructed by using the views and remarks of politicians (then Prime Minister John Howard and then Premier of Victoria Steve Bracks), Sporting Shooters Associations, the National Coalition for Gun Control, Gun Control Australia, and related stakeholders. It may also be argued that international circumstances of violence contributed to how this story was going to be framed. There were widely reported terrorist attacks a year earlier on 11 September 2001 in the United States, terrorist bombings (only days prior to the Xiang killings) in October 2002 in Bali resulting in many Australian fatalities, and sniper attacks during August-October 2002 in the United States. When politicians or institutions interested in gun control were used as a news source, gun-law-related and political themes emerged. The following headlines indicate the nature of the pretrial press coverage:

PM flags tougher gun laws. (TA 23 October 2002: 1)
Let’s not lower our guard on gun control. (AUS 23 October 2002: 14)
Howard to propose ban on semi-automatic handguns. (AUS 24 October 2002: 2)
National push to restrict pistols. (HS 24 October 2002: 1)
Handguns should be banned by Christmas. (AUS 25 October 2002: 1)
Gun spark blame war - Governments duck responsibility. (HS 9 January 2003: 11)
Surrender your weapons - handgun buyback begins. (HS 8 August 2003: 17)
The press framed this case as a gun problem, within “familiar” and readily recognizable newsworthy frames (Hall, 2001) because of the imminent elections at the time. Accordingly, narratives that criticized gun laws as being “lenient” dominated throughout Xiang’s pretrial period, evoking intense political debates. Furthermore, framing this case as a firearm issue reflected the cultural atmosphere and concerns at the time because some crimes reflect people’s anxieties, fears, and longstanding concerns at a given time (Innes, 2004); they are “signal crimes,” as Innes puts it, because they impact not only those immediately involved in the crime but also the wider community, reflecting their deeper fears and concerns. The aforementioned international cases of serious violence had occurred around the same time creating a “general” fear of crime and concerns about safety. Parallel to narratives about gun control issues, the press also reported on the “brave” victims who prevented a bigger tragedy from occurring, or the “good” and “innocent” victims who did not deserve to die. First the “heroes” were introduced:

Lecturer tells of tackling gunman - murder at Monash. (AUS 23 October 2002: 2)
Kung Fu champ - lecturers praised. (HS 23 October 2002: 3)
Hero professor back to reassure students - Murder at Monash. (AUS 23 October 2002: 2)
TAT A highlighted the bravery of the victims using police and paramedics’ quotes: “if the gunman hadn’t been subdued at the time, it would have been a major disaster” and “the people on the floor . . . were unbelievable . . . [they] definitely saved lives” (“Man held over Uni killings” 22 October 2002: 1). Following the portrayal of the “heroes,” narratives about the “good” and “innocent” victims began; the voices of their fellow students and teachers were adopted. The development of shifting the attention from the offender onto the victim is

identified by media scholars as tabloidization (Sparks & Tulloch, 2000) and sensationalism (Grabe, Zhou, & Barnett, 2001). The symbolic figure of a victim plays a role in political and policy debates (Garland, 2001, p. 11). Newspapers used the victims to reinforce the debate for tougher gun laws, lack of which was purported to be the reason why such “good” victims were “senselessly gunned down.” These themes constructed news features that provoke emotional responses about the death of such “ideal” victims; individuals who, when affected by crime, are “given the complete and legitimate status of being a victim,” carrying out a respectable job at the time of the crime and not responsible for being where they were when the crime occurred (Christie, 1986, p.17):

Victim lived in flat next door. (HS 23 October 2002: 5)
Professor sings praises of murdered Uni duo. (TA 24 October 2002: 2)
Memorial service to Honour slain student. (HS 25 October 2002: 10)
University weeps. (HS 26 October 2002: 9)
These news themes illustrate that when politicians and groups interested in gun-related issues were used as a news source, this case was principally framed as a firearm-related problem. When news sources included family, friends, and colleagues of the deceased victims, the press reported on the innocence or heroism of the victims of this crime.

5.1.2. News frames during court proceedings

After the presentation of the prosecution’s case at a committal hearing (22 April 2003) and the arguments from both legal parties during trial proceedings (15-16 June 2004), however, news frames reporting on “mental illness” in the context of this crime emerged:

Mental state an issue. (HS 23 April 2003: 15)
You never understand me - Uni shooter’s destiny to kill. (HS 12 September 2003: 3)
Uni gunman mentally ill. (HS 16 June 2004: 2)
Man psychotic during Uni killings. (TA 16 June 2004: 2)
Uni killer mentally impaired. (AUS 16 June 2004: 3)
This was a case in which both the prosecution and defense agreed that the accused was legally insane; a case of “consent insanity.” So when the press drew from either the prosecution’s or defense’s arguments, it framed the case as a “mental illness” issue. Xiang was “paranoid,” “psychotic,” “mentally ill,” and “mentally impaired.”

5.1.3. News frames after court proceedings

Once it was determined that Xiang’s behavior was due to his psychiatric illness, the “blame game” shifted from lenient gun laws and inappropriate firearm control to inadequate mental health funding and resources. This form of narrative reflects what Spector and Kitsuse (1973) argue in their seminal work of social problems and claim-making. After a specific claim is made about a problem (in this case, lenient gun laws) and governmental institutions recognize these claims and respond to them (political debates followed by tougher gun laws), assertions about the inadequacies and inefficacies of the responses become the new

claims around which new problems are recognized. Here, the new problem was around mental health issues because Xiang had to be held in prison until a bed was available at a psychiatric hospital. The outraged views of the trial judge were used to highlight this issue:

Politicians will need to consider the fact that we are now warehousing too many people in prison who are suffering mental illness. (“Paranoid killer gets 25 years” HS 18 June 2004: 11)

Similar themes followed in an opinion piece titled “Mental health fund lacks” by deputy director of SANE Australia - a national charity that seeks to improve the lives of people affected by mental illness by providing better services and support:

In Australia, it seems having a mental illness is still a crime in itself; what if these had occurred because of another illness . . . would [Xiang] now be in prison? It is unlikely; stigma is alive and well in Australia . . . governments which refuse to adequately fund mental health services . . . this . . . will lead to more such tragedies. (HS 22 June 2004: 17)

Subsequently, the failure of the University to protect the victims was reported. Attributing responsibility to institutions or state agencies makes for compelling and sensational stories when these bodies are blamed for failing to protect “innocent” victims (Greer, 2007, p. 32):
[Families claimed] Monash University failed to protect their sons and did not act on warning signs about Xiang’s deteriorating mental state. (“Shooting victims’ families sue Uni” HS 27 September 2005: 5)

The Xiang case is a fitting example of the shifting news frames between the pretrial, trial, and post-trial periods. News coverage about this offender’s mental illness and criminal behavior followed what was argued during court proceedings, once the case went to trial, because it is usually during these proceedings that details about an offender’s mental disorder in relation to their crime emerge. When the courts were not the news sources (and politicians or related groups were), the themes changed from issues of mental illness to gun-related problems. Overall, this case was more prominent when framed as a firearm issue, leading to a distorted image of violent behavior by mentally ill offenders such as Xiang. Given Xiang suffered from a severe mental illness, was socially isolated, and his crimes were the result of his delusions, news frames around these issues would have been more appropriate. Because of the political dimension and imminent elections in Victoria and nationally, however, firearm-related issues attracted more media attention leading to punitive measures in relation to gun control and shifting focus away from mental health related matters. More restrictive and punitive laws do not address the underlying issues of why some mentally ill offenders, like Xiang, become involved in serious violence and kill. This story could have been framed as a mental health or “life situations” problem that would highlight the need for better mental health facilities and appropriate services at workplace, in schools, and in universities. By highlighting some aspects of the story (firearm violence) and omitting other aspects (mental illness and social stressors), this story was constructed within specific news frames directing attention away from the omitted or downplayed issues, as described by Entman (1993). This case is an enlightening example that demonstrates that the way a news story is reported is dependent on the social, cultural, and political atmosphere in which it is reported. Consequently, this story of serious violence by a mentally ill offender did not automatically lead to the dominant portrayals of these offenders argued in the literature: inherent violence and dangerousness.

5.2. Case study 2 - Donna Fitchett

The second case study examines press coverage of the crimes of Donna Fitchett, who killed her two children on 6 September 2005 following marital disputes. The prosecution argued spousal revenge at her first trial (this was not argued as a motive in the second trial but she was nonetheless considered legally sane), but she claimed “mental impairment” due to severe depression as a defense at both her trials (having had a successful appeal of her first conviction). Her defense was rejected both times. After her first conviction, Fitchett was remanded to a psychiatric hospital for a minimum of 18 and maximum 25 years for treatment purposes, because her mental health had deteriorated at the time. After her second conviction, however, she was sentenced to an 18-27 year jail term because her mental health was stable and manageable in a prison environment. Before trial, Fitchett was the “sad” mother; a “good” mother. During and after legal proceedings, she was “mad” or “bad,” and ultimately deserved more severe punishment.

5.2.1. News frames before court proceedings

Following Fitchett’s arrest, both the HSH S and TAT A constructed narratives of a “good,” injured mother and of the “innocent” victims:

Wounded mum taken to hospital - two boys found dead. (HS 7 September 2005: 1-2)
DNA tests for mother of two boys. (TA 8 September 2005: 2)

Both articles reported on the “innocent” victims and the “wonderful” mother. Vulnerability (Christie, 1986, p. 19) and innocence (Walklate, 2007, p. 28) are the main features of “ideal” victims. By highlighting the innocence of child victims, the press added sensationalism and appeal to the story (Jewkes, 2004). Using quotes and opinions from neighbors and from people attached to the community of the school the boys had attended, TAT A described them as “little angels,” “good kids, playful, loving [who] loved to be involved in everything,” and “good little guys” (8 September 2005: 2). Fitchett was described as “a wonderful mother, who managed it well” and “spent much of her spare time with her children” (8 September 2005: 2). Emphasizing weakened and frail physical appearance, Fitchett was presented, in these early portrayals, as someone with “feelings”; a woman in despair, and not a “robot” or “monster” (Cavaglion, 2008) without any reactions to the events. She was a “sad” mother. Cavaglion (2008) argues that the “sad” mother portrayal is emphasized by softening external appearances with feminine stereotypes. This “sad” and “physically weak” narrative was more poignantly highlighted in the HSH S version of the story titled “Wrapped in misery”:
[She] was wrapped in a thin blanket . . . which she was using not to keep the heat in as much as the world out; she drew the blanket tight, buried her hair in it and sobbed; she rocked, shook and wept face buried in the blanket, leaving the court staggering, uncertainly, with a firm grip on the blanket - if only that; she had tired eyes, bedraggled hair; a woman with the life crushed out of her. (HS 8 September 2005: 3)

This theme continued after the first committal hearing in which details of Fitchett’s emotional and mental instability emerged.

5.2.2. News frames during court proceedings

After the second committal hearing, in which the prosecution presented its case, the press reported the details of the crime and their violent nature by emphasizing the prosecution’s argument of spousal revenge. The “bad” mother frame was introduced:

Bed time horror. (HS 9 August 2006: 2-3)
Mother drugged sons before murdering them. (TA 9 August 2006: 10)
Because at committal hearings the prosecution tests if it has a viable case, the press coverage that follows tends to depict offenders more negatively. At Fitchett’s first trial, based on evidence from one psychiatrist, the prosecution argued that the defendant set out a plan to kill her sons in order to punish her former husband for their “less than satisfactory” marriage and had carried out the murders in cold blood. During the second trial, the principal issue remained, and the prosecution argued that Fitchett knew what she was doing was wrong despite her suicidal tendencies and should be found guilty of murder. Reflecting these arguments and the negative views expressed by Fitchett’s former husband, the “bad” mother narrative was constructed. Some examples of the news headlines for this frame were:

Woman killed sons to punish husband. (TA 15 May 2008: 9)
Mother murdered two sons to get back at husband. (AUS 15 May 2008: 5)
Man reads . . . the letter from hell. (HS 16 May 2008: 7)
Mum knew what she was doing . . . horrific. (HS 21 May 2008: 24)
Contrarily, the defense argued that, at the time of the killings, Fitchett was suffering from severe depression, which impaired her understanding of right and wrong because she believed killing her children would be better than leaving them in the care of family or friends; she claimed it was an act of love. These arguments were used to construct a news frame of “madness” in the context of these violent crimes:

Killings an act of love. (HS 15 May 2008: 16)
Mum in turmoil before she killed sons. (TA 16 May 2008: 7)
Sons killed out of love. (HS 20 May 2008: 13)
News frames of both the “bad” and “mad” mother continued in the HSH S, in light of both the prosecution’s and defense team’s final address to the court. Titled “Mum knew what she was doing . . . killing horrific” the article reported that Fitchett “knew what she was doing was horrific, hideous and atrocious,” although according to her defense, she loved her sons and this was “a killing by a loving mother whilst ill” (21 May 2008: 24).

5.2.3. News frames after court proceedings

On 22 May 2008, the jury found Fitchett guilty on two counts of murder. A guilty verdict seems to have confirmed that Fitchett was “bad” rather than “mad.” Once the courts “ceased” to be a news source, the press adopted the views of Fitchett’s former husband to frame the “bad” mother story:

Mother guilty of murdering sons in fit of vengeance. (AUS 23 May 2008: 5-6)
Justice done as mother found guilty of sons’ murder. (TA 23 May 2008: 2)
Innocents betrayed by a mum. (HS 23 May 2008: 4)
Killer mum angry she’s behind bars. (HS 28 June 2008: 15)
Prison for ultimate betrayal. (HS 19 July 2008: 7)
Brutal mother gets 24 years for killing sons. (TA 19 July 2008: 11)
Father of two boys murdered tells - my hell. (HS 23 July 2008: 2)

One week after her sentence, Fitchett sought for an appeal against her conviction on the grounds that a miscarriage of justice had occurred because the trial judge had failed to explain the legal consequences of a “not guilty because of mental impairment” verdict. That is, the judge failed to explain that if the jury reached this verdict, Fitchett would not walk free but would be detained at a secure psychiatric hospital. The defense argued that this may have led jurors to reach a guilty verdict and appealed the conviction. This inspired narratives that criticized the “inadequacy” of Fitchett’s sentence and her legal right to appeal her conviction. Instead, the press suggested more severe punishment for the “cold-blooded” and “brutal” killer. The views of her estranged husband and the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) were adopted:

Killer mother appeals. (HS 26 July 2008: 13)
Justice system deficient and unfair. (TA 24 November 2008: 3)
More jail urged for killer mother. (HS 21 April 2009: 13)
Dad’s vow to lost sons appeals - court quashes ex-wife’s murder convictions. (HS 26 June 2009: 5)

Before trial, the press focused on Fitchett’s physical appearance and emotional instability, portraying her as a “sad” mother. Narratives about “mental illness and violence” only appear during legal proceedings and after the case went to trial. During trial in this case, narratives shifted between the “bad” or “mad” mother frames depending on whether it was the prosecution or the defense addressing the court because the way in which criminal behavior by a mentally ill offender is reported is significantly influenced by what is argued in court. Following Fitchett’s guilty verdict, media frames shifted from narratives of the “mad” and “bad” mother to those criticizing the leniency in her sentence and suggesting more severe punishment. These emerged when sentencing remarks of the trial judge, Mr. Fitchett’s views, or the DPP’s appeal were used as a news source. Once trial proceedings were finalized, narratives of madness became less dominant. 6{ }^{6}

The Fitchett case was reported within the two dominant news frames of mothers who kill: mad or bad. On the one hand, there are the “mad” mothers; those who are caring and nurturing, who take good care of their children, and who only kill them because of a mental illness. On the other hand, there are those who are poor and inept caretakers, who put personal pleasure and convenience above maternal sacrifice; the “bad” mothers (Barnett, 2006). The latter frame dominated in the Fitchett case and inspired calls for more severe punishment. When mothers are considered to transgress expected maternal behavior, the news media portray them as “monsters” and society turns on those who do not fit into standard perceptions and expectations of what constitutes a “good” mother (Goc, 2009). A somewhat simplistic conclusion of the “evil” mother was ultimately reached in this case

because reporters reinforced the cultural and social notions that “women who strove to be perfect, worked non-stop, and never complained were just fulfilling a biological destiny” (Barnett, 2006, p. 420). Mothers who did not fulfill this “natural” duty were evil, selfish, wicked, and “bad.” Casting mothers like Fitchett as either insane or evil is a narrative that led journalists to simplify this case without considering broader issues; issues such as the lack of social or family support for the day-to-day tasks that mothers are faced with when caring for their children. Kitzinger (1995, p. 214) asserts that “a great deal of depression among mothers goes unnoticed and neglected and there is little social support for a mother who is in danger of physically abusing her child.” One of the issues for journalists in reporting on these social risk factors of crime affecting mentally ill offenders is the lack of acknowledgment of such issues in the courts. Because the courts focus on the criminal act and criminal intent, social risk factors of crime are considered irrelevant to the legal test of mental impairment. Given the courts’ significance as media news sources about this matter, the press also focused solely on the criminal or medical aspect of this case. When reporting on cases such as the Fitchett case, journalists could look more closely at how the idealization of (good) motherhood discourages mothers from asking for help and discourages society from assisting them because it assumes that maternal instinct will “right” any challenging situation (Barnett, 2006). The broader context in which a mental illness such as depression can be exacerbated by stressful social conditions needs to be taken into account when reporting on cases like Fitchett. Journalists and editors should ask why this crime might have occurred by considering significant social risk factors whilst recognizing that expected social norms for “how mothers should be” shapes the way they frame these stories.

5.3. Case study 3 - Arthur Freeman

The final case study examines the news-framing devices used to depict the crime of Arthur Freeman. He threw his daughter off the West Gate Bridge on 29 January 2009, one day after an acrimonious custody and financial settlement battle with his former wife. The prosecution held that this was a case of spousal revenge. Freeman claimed he should be found “not guilty because of mental impairment” as his severe depression caused him to dissociate, rendering him incapable of knowing what he was doing or that it was wrong. His defense was rejected and he was found guilty of murder. This case was initially reported as a failure in the family law system, lack of suicide barriers on the bridge, and a case about an “evil” father. Once the case went to court, details about Freeman’s mental illness during the crime emerged.

5.3.1. News frames before court proceedings

Immediately after the incident, the community shock surrounding this case was emphasized by using bystander quotes of neighbors. The crime sparked debates for a quick installation of suicide-prevention barriers on the bridge. The voices and concerns of the Prime Minister (HS)(H S) and the Victorian Premier (TA,AUS)(T A, A U S) were used to report on the “action” that was being taken:

[1]

1. My thoughts, like those of all Australians, are with all those affected by this tragedy. (“Geelong’ feels shock” HS 31 January 2009: 8) ↩︎

Everyone is committed to trying to do whatever we can to try to ensure that nothing like this could ever, or would ever, happen again . . . the fact is it needs to be addressed now. (“Bridge barriers placed on fast track” TA 31 January 2009: 3)

Victorian Premier . . . promised to fast-track the installation of safety barriers on the bridge. (“Family rally around devastated mother” AUS 31 January 2009: 7)

The Freeman case evoked intense emotional reactions and responses in the public because it reflected the concerns and fears of the time (Innes, 2004). Given that other cases of filicide had occurred or had ongoing legal proceedings around the time of the Freeman murder, 8{ }^{8} this case evoked confronting emotions in the public about the capabilities and responsibilities of parents and the institution of family. Such emotional responses lead to the public using certain groups or individuals as scapegoats in a process of denying the reality of the capabilities that “we” all have in committing what is considered outside the social order (Garland, 2008). This case made a significant impact on Victorians, manifested by calls for a “national children’s day” in honor of the victim months after the incident. These calls reflect the deep-rooted concerns and fears about the role of parents to which most individuals can relate:

Bridge death girl’s family calls for national children’s day. (AUS 5 February 2009: 3)
Celebrate all kids, for Darcey’s sake - Special push to cherish youngsters all year round. (HS 6 October 2009: 3)

Through these calls and emotional reactions, individuals feel as if they have addressed a serious domestic issue by expressions of outrage and abhorrence toward specific individuals (Freeman), calls for better safety measures (suicide barriers), honoring the victim through a national children’s day, and criticisms of the family law system.

Following the Freeman incident, criticisms about the government’s failure in dealing with custody issues and the need to review and change existing family laws were prominent. Tougher laws to prevent a particular type of crime were also narratives that emerged in the Xiang case. Goode and Ben-Yehuda (1994) suggest that a moral panic appears when some members of society feel that they need to “do something” about an issue through tougher and more restrictive measures because particular evil-doers pose a threat to the moral order of that society. These beliefs were in contrast to what occurred in the Fitchett case because the offender rather than a “failed system” was to blame; beliefs that reflected and reinforced notions that mothers should care for their children “naturally,” and any breach of this duty is the mother’s inadequacy alone. But in the case of a father who killed his child, the family law system was under scrutiny:

Bridge tragedy to be probed. (AUS 6 February 2009: 3)
Shared parent law for rethink. (AUS 24 July 2009: 1)
Darcey tragedy to help violence review. (HS 25 July 2009: 13)
Shared parenting laws on way out. (AUS 19 October 2009: 1)
Call to end shared custody - government says automatic 50-50 parenting never the intention. (AUS 29 January 2010: 6, 13)

AUS reported that the government was planning “to roll back the controversial shared parenting law passed in the final term” of the previous government (19 October 2009: 1).

This prospect sparked intense debates for and against the decision with some political implications for leaders. AUS first began with conservative arguments that women are unreasonably preferred over men when considering family custody issues. Men’s Rights Agency (who advocate for equal rights of all men) argued that the existing laws encouraged “reasonable contact between perfectly good fathers and their children” and that “there are a million votes at stake” if the government rolls back the shared parenting laws (19 October 2009: 1). They argued that the planned changes were an attempt to “deny children shared parenting” and “an attack on a child’s right to be loved and cared for by a dad on a sharedcare, equal basis” (19 October 2009: 1). When the “shared parenting” laws were introduced by the (previous) Howard government, many critics saw it as reflecting this right-wing view and endangering women and children by being forced to “share care” with violent partners. AUSA U S also reported that the National Council for Children Post-Separation (which represents the interests of separated mothers) asserted that women were forced into contact with violent partners after those partners won the right to see their children. Attributing blame to the family law system was one of the ways the press sought to find explanations for such inexplicable circumstances of violence, in which children are killed by their parent.

5.3.2. News frames during court proceedings

Before trial and following a committal hearing, Freeman was the unemotional and therefore remorseless “bad” father:

Not a word from dad (HS 5 February 2009: 5).
Freeman betrayed no emotion yesterday; not when a witness described seeing hair and limbs as . . [his daughter] was dropped; he sat still, all day . . . mostly . . . stared ahead. (“‘No’ . . . it will never be all right” HS 8 October 2009: 4)

The press places emphasis on facial features and demeanour as an insight into an offender’s nature. Lack of emotion in a male offender is often seen as a sign of “male evil” (Cavaglion, 2009). AUS constructed this narrative reflecting the prosecution’s argument of spousal revenge and placing a witness’s remark as a headline and throughout the article:

It was like he was holding a bag and tipped it over; [Freeman] appeared perfectly normal [with a] blank vacant expression; he had no emotion on his face, like nothing had happened. (“I saw her fall, just like a rag doll” AUS 8 October 2009: 3)

In a retrospective interpretation, AUS (“Ex-wife told GP of fears for her children” 9 October 2009: 3) also reported previous instances of concern expressed by Freeman’s former wife because he would be “angry” with “large mood swings” and “vengefulness” two years before the incident. On 8 March 2011, the Freeman trial began. The prosecution argued that Freeman had killed his daughter motivated by spousal revenge because his former wife had altered their children’s custody arrangements such that he would get less time than previous arrangements. Adopting the prosecution’s opening and closing arguments as well as witness testimonies, the press portrayed Freeman as “evil,” remorseless, “bad.” The following are some examples:

Say goodbye to your children - chilling message haunts mother. (HS 17 March 2011: 2)
Darcey’s mother told “say goodbye”. (AUS 17 March 2011: 7)

Psychiatrist’s view on Darcey death: He did this for revenge. (HS 19 March 2011: 33)
No “mental illness” in bridge killing. (TA 22 March 2011: 5)
Adding to this portrayal of “evil,” witness accounts were that Freeman was emotionless after the killing: “he was totally neutral” (“Darcey can’t swim’, boy tells killer dad on West Gate Bridge - Frantic plea to save sister” HS 10 March 2011: 8), as if “he may have been posting a letter” (AUS “Darcey didn’t scream: brother” 10 March 2011: 3).

On the other hand, the defense argued that Freeman was mentally impaired at the time of the offense. His severe depression caused him to dissociate, like a “sleep walker,” so that he was acting like an automaton. Following the defense’s argument, the press detailed Freeman’s mental illness. This is when news frames of madness first appear in this case:

Insane plea by killer dad. (HS 9 March 2011: 5)
Dad who threw daughter off bridge disordered. (AUS 9 March 2011: 3)
Dad sobbing, trembling . . . falling apart. (HS 11 March 2011: 9)
CCTV shows father sobbing after killing Darcey. (AUS 11 March 2011: 5)
Dad like a sleep walker. (HS 18 March 2011: 15)
Darcey dad can’t recall drop. (AUS 18 March 2011: 8)
Aadopting the defense’s argument, Freeman was “incapable of reasoning in a rational manner” (HS 9 March 2011: 4) and was mentally “incompetent” as his mind was “highly disordered” at the time (AUS 9 March 2011: 3). These narratives illustrate the emphasis on the issue of mental illness and violence once trial proceedings commence and the defense’s arguments are raised. The defense is one of the most significant news sources for the construction of these frames.

5.3.3. News frames after court proceedings

Consistent with the findings in the Fitchett case, news narratives following Freeman’s guilty verdict emphasized and reflected the prosecution’s argument that this was a killing of a child by a “bad” father motivated by spousal revenge:

Guilty Killer dad warned ex-wife would regret custody fight. (HS 29 March 2011: 1)
We are perhaps fortunate he didn’t throw all three children over the bridge - Darcey’s dad knew what he was doing. (HS 29 March 2011: 4)
So angry [he carried out] the ultimate act of spousal revenge. (“Arthur Freeman guilty of daughter’s murder” TA 29 March 2011: 1).

The press also reported on the various “calls for action” in order to prevent similar tragedies.

Darcey death spurs call for family law changes. (AUS 30 March 2011: 3)
Darcey’s murder prompts call for child safety review. (TA 30 March 2011: 3)
Both AUSA U S and TAT A presented the debate amongst various interested authorities. Victoria’s Child Safety Commissioner had recommended a review of protocols between the Family

Court and child protection agencies, even though there were no indications of a system failure or any danger in the Freeman case. On the other hand, the president of Lone Fathers Association (an organization that assists fathers and lobbies publicly for shared parenting) argued that the Family Court system “is to take the blame for some of this” because more fund was spent on women’s services than men’s. Similarly, the HSH S reported the debates, criticisms, and recommendations put forward in the forms of opinion pieces (the first by the president of the Law Institute of Victoria, the second by the Chief Executive of The Australian Childhood Foundation) offering and suggesting “remedies” (Entman, 1993):

Prevent custody cases ending in violence, to protect children. (HS 30 March 2011: 40)
Darcey must spark change. (HS 30 March 2011: 40)

Contrarily, a researcher at the Domestic Violence Resource Center argued through an opinion piece that “fathers kill their children to punish their ex-partners” and not because of “custody angst”:

Men’s murderous revenge. (TA 31 March 2011: 21)

Like the previous two cases, this case also illustrates that news themes change depending on what is said and argued in court about the relevance of “mental illness” in a violent crime. In this case, news frames shift from family law issues and community reactions before trial, to those of the “bad” and “mad” father once trial proceedings commence. Although Freeman’s actions were abhorred and he was reported to have committed the crime because he was “evil,” motivated by spousal revenge, alternative explanations were also presented in this case. There were widely reported criticisms of the family law system in dealing with custody disputes because, according to men’s rights agencies, fathers were discriminated against as the system favored and protected women, and funded women’s services significantly more than they did for men. It was therefore “understandable” why Freeman might have resorted to violence. As the Lone Fathers Association argued, the system “is to take the blame for some of this.” There were additional and alternative explanations to Freeman’s crime in the press than just his “madness” or “badness.” Social and legal issues were included contrary to what occurred in the Fitchett case, resonating with contemporary issues of gender, and stereotypical expectations and (mis)understandings of what it means to be a mother and a father. That is, because fatherhood is perceived to be acquired and learned (Marsh, 1987; Wolins, 1983) in contrast to the standard beliefs that take motherhood for granted as a natural and biological destiny (Barnett, 2006), when a father kills, alternative explanations other than free will or madness are sought to explain the behavior, as seen in this case. Because fatherhood is not perceived to be a “natural” role, fathers might not be expected to naturally fulfill a non-biological role. As such, the press asked how this crime occurred and whether it could have been prevented. In the context of a mother killing her children, such as Fitchett, the cause is either madness or the mother’s inadequacies. When madness failed to explain Fitchett’s crimes, she was to blame. Alternative explanations for her crimes were not sought because a “good” mother does not need support for what is a natural role. By contrast, Freeman’s crime evoked more nuanced and broader debates.

6. The framing of mental illness and violent crime from court proceedings

Legal arguments about mental illness and violent crime influence media coverage of this topic in significant ways. The link between violent behavior and mental illness in the media follows legal proceedings, and what is argued and said in court about these offenders in the context of their criminal responsibility. Though this may not always be the case for all news stories that report on violence and mental illness (see Nairn & Coverdale, 2006), this study highlights the need to consider the role of the courts and legal narratives of mental illness when investigating or critiquing media coverage of this issue. Media scholars (such as Blood et al., 2002; Stuart, 2003) criticize, often rightly, the unbalanced and sensationalist media coverage of this issue. Some of these criticisms relate to the lack of press coverage on the social risk factors of violence and the many disadvantages faced by the mentally ill when violence is expressed. However, because the courts focus on the medical and criminal aspect of the subject matter in response to the specific requirements of the criminal law where mental illness is alleged, only these elements are reflected in the media. The law does not recognize criminogenic social risk factors that may be at play when violence is expressed in a mentally ill offender, because these factors are not relevant to the legal test of mental impairment. Given the courts’ significance as news sources about such matters, an unbalanced press coverage ensues with little or no consideration of social risk factors and their impact on criminal behavior. However, the press does not often report on the social circumstances of violent offenders who do not have a mental illness, and it is unlikely that it deliberately ignores these factors in the case of mentally ill offenders.

Although the study is based on three cases and generalizations about this issue cannot be made, the selected cases and the methodological approach give insight into the way these news stories were produced, interpreted, and reported. This study significantly contributes to the literature on media representations of mental illness as causing violence and to the theorizing of how this issue is reported, by examining a neglected component of the portrayal of persons affected by mental illness and their depiction within dominant news frames of “violence” and “dangerousness.” Significantly, the wealth of literature on this topic suggests that the media sensationalizes news stories of violence in the context of mental illnesses. The news themes examined in this article illustrate that the way in which people with mental illness are portrayed varies, depending on the social, cultural, and political atmosphere in which their stories are reported, as well as the legal proceedings in which these offenders are involved. It is thus unlikely that people with a mental illness are always reported within one dominant news frame of “violence” in sensational depictions (see Harper, 2005) because people without a mental illness belonging to every social group and involved in violence can also be over-represented in the news. The mentally ill are unlikely to be uniquely emphasized as violent in the media because the media focuses on violence rather than mental illness. Senior Herald Sun reporter Shelley Hadfield, who has covered crime stories for over six years and covered the Fitchett case extensively, argues that it is the “violence” element of a story that is newsworthy, rather than any other aspect:

[1]

1. There was never a time when we covered a case because someone had a mental illness . . . it’s the violent behavior that is the newsworthy aspect of a story. Most decisions about whether a story is reported or not wouldn’t be . . . based on the person’s mental illness. Generally, a story is chosen because of the nature of what’s occurred, rather than whether someone involved in it has a mental illness. (21 December 2010) ↩︎

Similarly, James Madden, who covered crime stories for several years (including the Xiang case) and is the Chief of Staff at the Sydney office of The Australian, points out that the basic elements of covering and framing a crime story are: “What happened, who was affected, who may have been killed, who may have been involved in the acting out of the crime, and perhaps what other motives were there and who else was affected” (7 June 2011). Usually, when it is a “big crime from a media perspective,” personal details about the offender and the victim /s/ \mathrm{s}, and the reasons why the crime occurred are reported in order to build a more “human story of what happened,” and the issue of mental illness is simply part of this background when it later emerges “further down the track” (Madden 7 June 2011). Madden adds that prominence and newsworthiness is based on a crime story being “shocking” with elements that are “extreme,” so that a story about a mentally ill offender involved in abusing or killing someone may not be as prominent as, for example, a crime in which children are involved (7 June 2011).

Experienced crime reporter Andrea Petrie, from The Age (one of the lead reporters of the Freeman case) confirms this point. She explains that after reporting the basic elements of a crime story, such as “who’s done it” and “what happened,” newsworthiness is determined by how many people a story affects, particularly if it is a case of violence toward others (10 May 2012). In the context of mental illness, Petrie believes details of an offender’s mental health state at the time of a crime are vital and should be reported, although this is often limited, she says, by newspapers’ space constraints. Although mental illness can have news appeal when linked to extreme violence, Petrie argues that rather than contributing to newsworthiness, mental illness is a detail that can provide readers contextual insight about mitigating factors and avoid beliefs such as “lock this guy up, throw away the key” (10 May 2012).

Prominence is more likely a matter of reporting a story of serious violence within familiar, contextual, and newsworthy frames in line with audiences’ schemata, whilst also stating facts about the offenders involved; such as their mental illness. Hadfield (21 December 2010) concludes that an offender’s mental illness is a matter of reporting facts; if the offender happens to have a psychiatric disorder, it is covered, but “in a court story, it’s the offence that is the newsworthy aspect.” Madden also asserts that the issue of mental illness is secondary in a crime story, and it may lead to questions about treatment, release to the community, or previous offenses, but these are “a side issue” and are not considered elements of newsworthiness when deciding what to include in a crime story (7 June 2011). This is manifested in Madden’s response, when asked why the Xiang case was more prominent as a gun-control issue rather than a mental health problem, with articles addressing the latter being significantly less than those covering the former issue. When legal proceedings were finalized, the case “didn’t really gain that much media attention and that was . . . the end of it” in terms of reporting on his mental illness (7 June 2011). Importantly, though, when reporting about an offender’s mental illness - whether as a “side issue” in the context of treatment, or “a fact” from legal sources, or to provide context in relation to mitigating factors - word selection, language, rhetoric, and structure may frame a story to make sense of these crimes within common-sense understandings of madness and violence (see Rapley, McCarthy, & McHoul, 2003), particularly when reporters must make sense of the various definitions of this topic. Common-sense understandings about madness and violence may see a discrepancy if an offender knew the nature and quality of the conduct but did not know it was wrong. This may mean that reporters frame these stories using common-sense understanding of insanity rather than the legal definition.

7. Conclusion

Whilst recognizing the concept of “free media” in democratic societies, both the courts and media could work collaboratively in order to improve how mental illness, in the context of violence, is depicted and understood. Media representatives could draw more heavily from other, equally important, news sources when covering stories about violent mentally ill offenders; for example, psychologists, psychiatrists, and social workers. Considering the time and space constraints of news reporting as well as the “need” to maximize sales and report news within minutes of an incident occurring, however, it might be unrealistic to expect a balanced, in-depth coverage from the media. And when in-depth coverage occurs, for example through opinion pieces, these are published in the later pages of newspapers (pages 30−4030-40 ) where they are unlikely to be seen by a large number of readers as most people read the first 15 pages of newspapers in which the most prominent stories are published (Paulsen, 2003). One solution would be for courts to take a more proactive role in providing journalists contextual information about mentally ill offenders and legal concepts such as “mental impairment,” criminal responsibility, and sentencing considerations. Currently, the Supreme Court and the County Courts both have liaison court officers who liaise with the press about cases. The Court of Appeal provides summaries of judgments and facts about a case to the press. However, providing facts and main findings would not address the issue of why and how such decisions are reached, and what legal principles are applied in various cases - which leads to noncontextual media coverage of this topic.

As seen in the Fitchett case, the press does not appear to fully comprehend the complexities of legal concepts and procedures in relation to mentally ill offenders. Narratives of outrage and shock appeared when Fitchett was first sentenced to a psychiatric hospital because the press does not appreciate that the law can take into account an offender’s mental health at the time of sentencing regardless of culpability. Similarly, the press criticized the leniency of the legal system toward those who claim mental impairment following Fitchett’s appeal and retrial because the legislation provided in s22(2)(a) of the CMIA is not well understood. This legislation states that a trial judge is obliged to explain to the jury the legal consequences of a “not guilty because of mental impairment” finding. Because the trial judge failed to do so during the first trial and this may have misled the jury in making a crucial decision, there was a breach of s22(2)(a) and it was within Fitchett’s legal rights to appeal her conviction. Furthermore, the press often expressed outrage and frustration toward offenders such as Fitchett and Freeman for claiming mental impairment, calling for more severe punishment because they were viewed as fabricating and employing this defense for a more lenient sentence. But this particular defense goes to the heart of whether an offender is legally responsible for his/her action and carries with it indefinite detention at secure psychiatric facilities. More significantly, the legislative aim in going with this defense is so that mentally ill offenders can receive the required treatment and be rehabilitated rather than “get away” with more lenient sentences.

Clearly, it is idealistic to assume that most reporters can easily acquire and interpret legal details into a coherent story; assuming the courts issue clear statements that can be understood by ordinary readers easily and considering the degree of competition for newspaper space, time, and consumers. Thus, the courts can take a more positive role in how mental illness is portrayed in the context of violence. And there is a democratic argument for this. As the Honorable Justice John Doyle, Chief Justice of South Australia (1999), commented on this matter, the courts have an obligation to inform the public about how they work: if they leave it to the media to report about how they operate, then “the courts are saying that they are content to leave it to others to shape the public understanding and perception of the courts” when they “are well placed to explain their function.” Courts

should cooperate with the media because it is through the media that the public is informed about legal proceedings. They have a “responsibility to assist the media” because public confidence in the judiciary is enhanced if the courts “assist the media to communicate accurate information to the public” and the public can “exercise their democratic right” to the courts through this collaborative approach (Doyle, 1999). Courts have long accepted public access to legal proceedings to observe and understand how they operate due to the notion of justice administered in public. However, “that in turn means those who choose to resort to the courtroom, which is usually relatively few people” (Doyle, 1999). As such, courts should try to be more involved in assisting journalists to better understand the more technical aspects of legal issues and legal proceedings, and in doing so reach those who choose not to exercise the right of access in person; they should inform them of how the courts operate and why they operate in specific ways, as this is the democratic right of the public. Whilst considering the nature of contemporary journalism, courts are “obliged to point out deficiencies in the manner in which the media informs” the public about them and “do what they can to make their processes comprehensible to the media and, through the media, to [the public] generally” (Doyle, 1999). Nonetheless, the media also has responsibilities. It rarely attempts to report the reasons behind specific legal decisions, focusing more on the basic facts of a crime story, the surviving victims’ reactions and their circumstances, the offenders involved and their physical features, the verdict, and the sentence, in a manner that fails to contextualize various issues. However, an accurate coverage requires the cooperation of the courts because they, as an institution, “have an obligation to inform [the public] about their work” (Doyle, 1999). Matters of mental illness and violence, the principles and concepts behind legal proceedings of mentally ill offenders, and how the press covers this issue require a collaborative approach from both institutions because there is a democratic argument for the courts to be involved in this approach, as the media has the responsibility to provide a more accurate coverage.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank the 2012 Monash University Postgraduate Publication Award.

Notes

1. For the purposes of this study, the term “courts” refers to those who are better placed to inform and shape the perception of the media and the public about complex and nuanced legal concepts such as legal insanity, mental illness, and its effects on criminal responsibility: judges, prosecutors, and defense lawyers.

2. A notable exception being investigative journalism.

3. This term replaced the common law insanity defense that derives from the M’Naghten case in 1843, in which Daniel M’Naghten shot and killed the prime minister of England’s secretary, mistakenly thinking he was the prime minister. M’Naghten was under the delusion that he was being persecuted by the British Government. The M’Naghten rule states that to establish a defense on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proven that at the time of committing the act: (i) the party accused was laboring under such a defect of reason, from a disease of the mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act being committed or; (ii) if the accused did know it, that he or she did not know that the act was wrong.

4. This article reports the findings of a research that examined the insanity defense in Victoria and media representation of mentally ill offenders tried in this jurisdiction. As such, the three most high profile cases from Victoria were selected for analysis (see Table 1).

5. The other national daily newspaper is The Australian Financial Review. Given its focus on financial issues, it was not selected for this study.

6. Fitchett was granted a retrial, which began on 12 April 2010. For the purposes of this article, press coverage of the second trial is not examined as the news frames were similar to those from the first; Fitchett was “bad” following the prosecution’s argument or “mad” if the defense arguments were the news sources. The suggestion for severe punishment was emphasized, yet again, during the second sentencing.

7. Geelong is a city in the Australian state of Victoria, in which Freeman attended high school.

8. In 2007 and again in 2010, Robert Farquharson was found guilty of murdering his three children. The Crown argued Farquharson was motivated by spousal revenge, following a separation from his former wife. In 2008 and again in 2010, Donna Fitchett was found guilty of murdering her two children, motivated by spousal revenge. In 2009, Aliya Zilic went to trial for slitting his son’s throat and killing him. In 2010, Rajesh Osborne shot his three children and then himself, following a marriage separation. It is important to note that although the Rajesh incident occurred in 2010 and these emotional public responses were reported in 2009, it can be argued that it contributed to the public response during and after Freeman’s trial in 2011.

Notes on contributor

Meron Wondemaghen, PhD , is a Lecturer in Criminology at the University of New England and Associate Lecturer in Behavioral Sciences at Monash University. She received her Bachelor of Medical Science (Honors) from the University of Melbourne in 2005, and her doctoral degree in Criminology from Monash University in 2012. She has published in the International Journal of Law and Psychiatry and Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism. Her research interests include forensic mental health, criminal law and psychiatry, criminology, and media coverage of crime.

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