Re: Editorial Response - New Haven Register clueless as usual
How many things can one local paper get wrong in one editorial? In the New Haven Register's December 8th editorial about the murder of Suzanne Jovin we had a chance to find out.
First of all, Jovin was not "stabbed to death in the East Rock neighborhood of New Haven", she was found stabbed to death in that area. Lest we think this was just an inadvertent error, they go to write "It is not even known why Jovin was walking in the neighborhood." Jovin was seen walking around in that area??? Say what?!
The Register goes on to categorize gross ineptitude by the New Haven police as a series of "setbacks". First they mention how "sophisticated tests of animal hairs taken from Jovin's coat failed to offer any clue." Is the fact such fibers were important enough to make front page headlines in the Register on March 1, 1999, yet were never sent to be tested until early November 1999, when they made headlines yet again, just a setback? Is the fact results were known from these tests in December of 1999 but reported on April 20, 2000 only because an AP reporter called the investigating scientist herself just a setback? Why hasn't the Register written any editorials about why the New Haven police apparently tried to withhold that information from the public?
Speaking of withholding evidence, the lead investigator of the Jovin murder and another detective are being investigated by a grand jury for doing just this in another high-profile murder. Once again, the Register characterizes this as just a setback.
The Register then quotes the New Haven police as saying they "believe Jovin knew her killer. The fact that she was stabbed 17 times suggests a violent, personal passion." Exactly who said this? Might it have been one of the four detectives and supervisors originally assigned as investigators the Register notes no longer remain on the case? Might the fact the primary reason Yale has had to hire their own private investigator, again mentioned by the Register, be because Yale also recognizes those same policemen had totally botched the investigation?
The Register points out that Yale's other two murders involved "muggings that went awry." Yet they somehow conclude that "robbery does not appear to have been a motive in Jovin's death." Based on what? Most muggers want cash or credit cards. Jovin's wallet was back in her Park Street apartment. Who is to say she wasn't killed because someone didn't get enraged she wasn't carrying it?
Here we have an editorial lamenting about how a two-year murder investigation -- focused totally around one member of the Yale community -- has gone absolutely nowhere from day one, yet the author somehow concludes "The answer to the mystery of Jovin's death may be found on the Yale campus." One thing is certain, wherever answers are to be found, one place they won't be is in the New Haven Register.
- Jeff |
