Serious and Sensational Story

As part of our assignment we have been given the task of writing about two types of news stories. I have chosen to look at a serious and sensational story, and also an invasion of privacy one. 

Firstly, I am going to analyse the case of the missing mystery four year old girl who was found living with a Roma couple in Greece. She bears no resemblance to the people that claimed to be her mother and father, and this led to further investigation which shows she also has no biological match to them. 

There are many different stories surrounded by how the little girl came to the couple. One story is that she had been found in a blanket, another that she had been handed to them by strangers. 

There are also DNA tests being done to check if 3 other minors that live with the family are actually their own children. Drugs and firearms have also been found on the settlement.
The girl is now in the care of a charity called A Childs Smile, which are seeking help to find her parents. It has been said that the police are looking back to kidnaps in 2009 which may help the story. 

This story was prioritized in the public eye as it would help the police with any information they needed to know as to who the child's biological parents really were. They put this story on the front pages of newspapers so that everybody could be made aware of this stories priority. 

The story had to have immediacy. The sooner a story goes out, the sooner the answers and clues can start coming in. The police also got involved very quickly to try and help with the situation. However it couldn’t be as immediate as it needed to be in the newspapers, as they had to wait for the next days print to come out. 

A story like this could have a follow up angle of something like visiting the family members, for instance the mystery girls mother, and asking her how she felt when she saw her child all over the news, and what, in her words, had happened. This can then be made into a story itself and the public will be interested as so much coverage was done of the young girl in the first place. Another follow up story was the one of Madeline McCan, another missing girl, who then was thought to also be in a traveler camp somewhere. 

This story was also broadcasted on the television and radio which of course both require audio clips. Al lot of which are taken from the scene of the crime. Newspapers, Radio and TV stations all featured quotes who knew about the situation. These are needed when trying to make the story more believable as when it comes from the mouths of people who know best, it tends to seem more real. A lot of quotes were taken throughout this time, for example, “the y told us that they didn’t give her any money, and that they met by accident. This was from an inside source who lived on the traveler site. 

This story is Human Interest as a lot of other people are affected on a regular basis when their own children go missing. A story like this could give them hope in finding their own child in a situation like this. When something terrible like this happens, the public tend to get involved with it more anyway, due to the fact that it triggers peoples emotions. Police officers around Europe also all wanted to get involved with the case which will also give the people involved hope. 

Overall I feel that this is a human interest piece as it sparked hope amongst the public in finding a lot of missing children. I think that the media covered this story well and in a respectful way.