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Posted on Apr 29, 2013

Lessons From Breaking News During The Boston Marathon Manhunt

The lessons from breaking news of the Boston Marathon attack manhunt in the hyper-digital age are the Journalism 101 lessons that have always guided breaking news.

by MicahGrimes

Community Contributor

1,000 reporters, no official reason we should be here. http://t.co/Sc6lyM2QrL-- jessica testa

The ipso facto reason for inaccuracy in any breaking news situation comes down to our interactions as humans.

Whether information comes from a friend, a reporter, a news outlet or data-crunching software, the beginning- and end-games lie at the hands of a fallible human:

misunderstanding, lies, distortions, imagined correlation, oversimplification, hyperbole, memory confusion, post-event memory inclusion, influence, pressure…

Every breaking news lesson below, gleaned from the events surrounding the Boston Marathon attack and manhunt, returns to the human and its fallacy.

Police on scanner identify the names of #BostonMarathon suspects in gunfight, Suspect 1: Mike Mulugeta. Suspect 2: Sunil Tripathi.-- Anonymous

Scanner traffic is like antifreeze: It's smells and tastes sweet, but it can be poisonous when ingested.

Pick any newsroom in the nation and you will find at least one police or fire scanner "chirping" with the sound of directives, from one to any number of agencies. In larger markets with multiple agencies, there will be 10 to 20+ potential dispatches sounding at once, with a poor soul or two trying to pick out the newsworthy chatter.

The dispatchers heard are often giving basic but active information to their first responders in the field, without a need to share the rest of the overall picture that those first responders were already briefed on or they can then find in files on their computer dashboards.

But as the Boston Marathon attack manhunt showed, there are also regular citizen newshounds pinning their ears to listen in. This is nothing new: amateurs have listened into scanners on their self-bought radios since the advent of radio dispatch. With the advent of Internet sites like Radioreference.com, and citizen information-sharing websites like Twitter, Facebook and Reddit, a true Pandora's box has opened to allow practically any incident on a scanner to become a major local news event ergo regional and national-come-international news event.

When something notable occurs on the scanner, a proper newsroom contacts the dispatching agencies to confirm with the actual dispatcher the information their fallible ears are hearing come over the often crackling, undulating scanner speakers -- and get further information not being shared over dispatch.

This is the vital step that is ignored or simply unknown with social reporting -- some know the requirement it and ignore it; many listening in for the first time have a tendency to take scanner traffic as overall fact, because they don't know from experience.

And yes, even some of those tourchbearing journalists and outlets fell to the intense pressure to report scanner traffic to stay out front of the story. When the truth came, they wound up behind.

To further exacerbate the information flow -- or lack thereof -- you rarely hear what dispatchers refer to as "tac" - or tactical - channels.

When major incidents occur, agencies generally switch to tac channels in an effort to not tie up a main dispatch line. They will carry out their tactical operations -- a shooting, major crash, SWAT standoff -- on these tac channels:

threatpost.com

The vast majority of dispatching you hear on sites like RadioReference.com intentionally will not include known tac channels, as they are often used for dangerous, deadly situations that require intensely vital communication and tactical setup; though sometimes, such incidents will remain on those main channels, and therefore, go out over those scanners.

UPDATE: Boston Police are asking social media users not to post information they hear on police frequencies/scanner channels.-- CBS News

There are even rare times radio frequencies get crossed or a communicator finds themselves on the wrong frequency accidentally -- or intentionally. (I have heard Miami helicopter communication picked up on a two-way radio system in a Tampa newsroom.)

As a result of one or all, myriad information is missed, misinterpreted or construed when listening and reporting via dispatched communication.

I joined in the breaking news reporting that night and distinctly remember myself and others actively warning against reporting scanner traffic, because of the above reasons:

That said, scanner traffic is tempting, but dangerous reporting.-- Micah Grimes

There was experience in those words, as we would see.

Though it is dangerous, the information coming across scanners is usually quite accurate. But experience being the greatest teachers, an experience of inaccurate information crossed a dispatch line and it quickly seeped into the social universe.

Journalists and other hawks listening heard names and began sharing them.

Soon, amateur but normally accurate thoughtleaders shared them.

And ultimately, the everyday user -- the viral driver -- began sharing them.

We still have no idea who Mike Mulugeta is:

twitter.com

Missing Brown University student Sunil Tripathi had absolutely no connection to anything related to the bombings or manhunt. In fact, his body was later found in a river:

nytimes.com

"The family of Sunil Tripathi, a Brown University student who disappeared last month — and was briefly misidentified as a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings — confirmed Thursday that his body had been found near Providence, R.I.

There has been much debate on if the names were actually given out by a dispatcher. Some say you can't find it on recordings of dispatching from that night:

theatlantic.com

"How a terrible misidentification of two people with no connection to the Boston bombing spread so far, so fast..."

But I asked the next day if anyone else had assuredly heard the and got responses that they were sure they had heard it and soon saw such being reported by citizens and journalists alike:

Anyone still awake who actually heard the scanner traffic last night that allegedly named missing Brown student?-- Micah Grimes

RT @AlexYoder: @MicahGrimes I heard it...then saw all the tweets that now contain bad information.-- Micah Grimes

When the proverbial or literal bullets start flying, the mind launches into an ascending state of survivalist panic on varying levels.

Humans have the natural tendency to piece together causality of events that may or may not be connected, in order to decide what their fight-or-flight decision will be.

From law enforcement down to the runners on the streets and John Doe tweeting from South America, it seemed perfecto plausible and almost certain to think what turned out to be an unrelated fire at Boston's JFK Presidential Library was related to the attack:

As the fog cleared:

boston.com

"A fire and possible explosion this afternoon at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum prompted a full-scale investigation by local, state, and federal authorities to determine whether the incidents were linked to the deadly Boston Marathon blasts."

bostonglobe.com

"The fire at the JFK Presidential Library and Museum in Boston Monday was caused by careless disposal of smoking materials, city fire officials said."

Boston FD official report on Monday's fire at JFK Library says blaze was caused by "careless disposal of smoking material." (@DotNews)-- BuzzFeed News

Humans look for sensory connections in everything in order to make a mental map for decisions on how to approach and handle their surroundings -- feet away, across the streets or on the other side of the world:

Such as:

UPDATE: Large police presence around vehicle on Elmwood & 19th in #NiagaraFalls. Car has Mass. plates. Unsure if connected to #Boston.-- WGRZ

These search results, like finding correlation in the bombings and the library fire, can also exhibit in our ability to use mountains or large building for direction -- but also our strange ability to find animals in clouds as a child or Satan's face in smoke billowing from the World Trade Center:

Or this image that went an outrageous step further and added an outline of Satan with a pitchfork, a troll body and a tail:

When we are panicked by the unknown, and even the thought-known, we begin reaching and looking for answers -- even the professionals.

For much of the manhunt, law enforcement was forced to consider the possibility the suspects were setting booby traps -- or wearing suicide vests:

MT @Zeninjor: State Police: Authorities cannot rule out possibility bombing suspect is wearing explosive vest. http://t.co/NODSi4Ljuc-- Micah Grimes

BREAKING NEWS: Police fear suspect in terror bombings is wearing an explosive vest, source tells Globe.-- The Boston Globe

Neither were, but the weight of the possibility was so heavy, there was no way of debunking the theory until they had their bodies in custody.

When reports include the above words, it means there is information skepticism, or more often, the basic inability to independently confirm; they are instant triggers words to have your own skepticism of the "reports."

It gets egregious in the times local to international outlets include the term "reports say" and never cite a single on of the sources of a report.

It's a tactic of reporting as if their own, to stay in the lead, while somehow deflecting ultimate ownership to the "reports" to the unidentified outlets, even with the understanding that the report is then theirs, because they chose not to identify the competing sources.

When someone knows concrete information, they have no reason to provide such doubtful words. If the words are used, their is doubt.

The lesson about such words comes down to: maybe = maybe not.

The semantics of identifying a person involved in some way to an incident are important. That showed during the manhunt. Often, law enforcement will identify someone they just want to speak to as a "person of interest."

PHOTO: MT â€@megan0625: This is the person police had on the ground: http://t.co/Z3dFaAFRYE-- Micah Grimes

During the night, there were innocent people in the area who had to be stopped, searched and cleared before being allowed to proceed. A standard practice in violent crimes where a suspect is at large, law enforcement will flood the surrounding area, set a perimeter and search anyone or anything that is suspicious.

It led to some calling those who were seen stopped "suspects," when in reality, they were just witnesses or persons of interests due to their presence inside the perimeter, or having some kind of connection to the actual suspects.

UPDATE: WCVB reporting first person taken into custody has been released and is walking home - @wsbtv-- Micah Grimes

The importance of giving proper classification to a person related and not related to an incident is paramount for the safety and reputation of that person, much less the legal ramifications of misidentifying a person as a suspect, or even being so lackadaisical to omit classification entirely and identify the person as if they are surely the perpetrator.

ABC: 3 individuals taken into custody by FBI late this afternoon in New Bedford, MA in connection with manhunt - @itsdavidford-- Micah Grimes

@MicahGrimes someone on reddit said he seen the 2 boston bombers at a motel 6-- Brian Wolfe

To date, every person identified in any such way to be a possible suspect outside of the brothers has been cleared, though the investigation continues.

There are journalists. There are reporters. Anyone can be a reporter, reporting what they see, hear, think, feel, taste. Relative to anyone, few can be journalists.

It is the job of the journalist to go the further steps to gather and confirm the information that the citizen is reporting.

The accuracy of breaking news most often fails when journalists fall into roles of reporting, sharing any information that has a hint of plausibility.

The onus to report confirmed information and debunk inaccuracy in the social news universe falls on the torchbearing, thought-leaders who are established in such practices long before a breaking news situation occurs.

Established news agencies, individual professional journalists or even amateur but skilled Twitter personalities, there those who can cultivate, research, confirm and report information in a responsible manner.

In breaking news events, especially major events such as the Boston attack, individuals feel the same need as journalists to help and share information quickly, but they don't feel the need to verify or crosscheck sources before sharing new information, especially if it comes from a source they trust.

For some, they trust CNN or the Boston Globe. For some, they trust Reddit or @YourAnonNews or InfoWars. For some, they trust their brother or sister posting something they saw on Facebook.

Social sources of accurate information in relatively minor breaking news events usually correlate to accuracy during major breaking news events, but not always.

I followed my own advice and held back most of the night from even mentioning Tripathi, but even I fell to the overwhelming but unconfirmed plausibility that it could be him when an apparent friend of his tweeted her belief, finally, that it was him:

RT @kmattio: Oh my god. It was Sunil. I'm shaking. I cannot believe it.-- Micah Grimes

My confidence in her assertion was dashed and I knew I shared too soon when the tweet was quickly followed by:

I cannot say this in a manner that is any clearer. I never said Sunny was definitively Suspect 2. I said I saw a resemblance between photos.-- Kami Mattioli

She did nothing wrong. She was just sharing information to her community. I was the hunter-gatherer who should have taken the time to talk to her and confirmed -- or waited for a reputable outlet to do so.

CNN blared the report that a suspect was in custody.

The pressure built and other old reliables like Reuters fell to the pressure to report:

Some assert the pressure of CNN's way-out-front report pressured FOX News, the Associated Press and the Boston Globe to then come out with their own reports of the same:

The source, or sources, of these reports wasn't a fly-by-night whim to get in line with CNN's report. Boston Globe editor Brian McGrory has since told Harvard's Nieman Lab:

nieman.harvard.edu

"We had a gold standard law enforcement source tell a lead reporter something, and we went with it online for about an hour. Then we immediately explained [that the information was wrong]."

The law enforcement source wasn't trying to mislead.

The reporter wasn't trying to mislead.

The Boston Globe, CNN, FOX News, AP, Reuters and every other reputable outlet wasn't trying to mislead.

It was just wrong information, all around.

As a result of the information, the news was broken -- and the news was broken. The system failed, because it is a system created and carried out by humans, reporting on humans.

@EllieVHall captured the essence of the reporting confusion:

buzzfeed.com

"Reports of 'arrest' backpedaled to 'no one in custody' in less than an hour. Here's a timeline of the conflicting and confusing reports."

Examples of firsthand, eyewitness accounts of incidents are becoming more common.

With that, the urge to get their accounts out as quickly as possible is now hyper-pressurized.

The first-hand account is always the gold standard for any news story, but only with social media have witnesses been able to provide their dictated account immediately, while also sharing their pictures, video and audio without having to go through an established outlet.

Providing the definitive eyewitness account of the shootout with the brothers, Andrew Kitzenberg sent out his first tweet with an alert to the shootout out his window and a picture to prove it:

Shoot out outside my room in Watertown. 62 Laurel st. #mit #boston #shooting http://t.co/Lvk7rtx1gV-- Andrew Kitzenberg

And went on to provide chilling chronology of the now-war zone, with amazing pictures of the scene:

Site of the bomb explosion on laurel st. bomb detectors are out #mitshooting #boston #mit http://t.co/jjsqynbbzL-- Andrew Kitzenberg

#mit #mitshooting #boston http://t.co/SpMhbgukvV-- Andrew Kitzenberg

A dozen officer going into our yard at 62 laurel st. #mitshooting #mit #boston http://t.co/JiGvamx8Ze-- Andrew Kitzenberg

Swat is out on laurel st.
#mitshooting #boston #mit http://t.co/ojlbXWEShv-- Andrew Kitzenberg

Officer are searching on oak st, just a block from laurel st. #mitshooting #mit #Boston http://t.co/88FH7XlgUY-- Andrew Kitzenberg

From that same Pandora's Box comes the ability for Internet detectives to hit the ground running on their own investigations.

The correlations Reddit users were coming up with for suspects on the now-private http://www.reddit.com/r/findbostonbombers/ were interesting and compelling.

slate.com

"Over the past three days, the armchair detectives on Reddit's findbostonbombers message board have worked their way through all the people with backpacks in all the photos they could find of the area around the Boston Marathon finish line, looking for possible suspects in the bombing."

Every picture suggesting connection to a person on the thread was wrong. Despite compelling correlatives, there simply was no connection found by Internet sleuths. The FBI was the first to release images of the brothers.

The practice of crossreferencing and crosschecking against other reliable sources, while performing further research across platforms, usually sends the Drudge police light spinning if something isn't right.

It doesn't always work, as seen with the premature suspect arrest reports, but it allows for confidence in reporting that citing a single source can't.

Those pictures that do seem to be real can tell the thousands words.

An alleged picture of Suspect #2 surfaced on Twitter. He was on the ground, surrounded by tactical law enfocement, being searched.

It appears who I could determine was the original source of the picture has since deleted it, along with tweet: https://twitter.com/Hossenator/status/325419984954208257/photo/1

I first came across the picture when tweeted by always-reliable @EthanKlapper, but, I quickly noticed, he included no source of where it came from -- unlike him.

I asked and was directed to a New York Times editor, @carolynryan, and ultimately found my way to @Hossenator, who somehow on this planet came up with the first and only picture of Suspect #2 two being taken into custody that I have seen:

How he got it and why it deleted it, I do not know. I don't know that it has even ever been officially confirmed. But, so goes the wagering confidence in sources from social media.

There are agencies who make it a matter of practice to stretch truth and even others who jumped off the truth deepened from their inception.

Some feel the New York Post identified two males seen in a picture from the Boston Marathon as suspects in the bombing.

The Post told Politico that they merely shared an image that law enforcement was sharing:

politico.com

The Post has a history of taking facts and punching in the face, so they stagger back while still standing.

For sites like InfoWars, their money is made off of being wrong and promulgating the wrong in a way that it seems amazingly right.

@BuzzFeedAndrew put together size "6 Mind-Blowingly Ridiculous Conspiracy Theories Surrounding The Boston Bombing," including one from InfoWars:

buzzfeed.com

Note: Any video report that has bongos playing in the background and uses computer generated flames to report a story is liking lacking accuracy. — youtube.com

**Note:** Any video report that has bongos playing in the background and uses computer generated flames to report a story is liking lacking accuracy.

youtube.com

**Note:** Any video report that has bongos playing in the background and uses computer generated flames to report a story is liking lacking accuracy.

The best practice in these situations -- a practice the conspiracy theorists preach against -- is to check the established, respected, accurate outlets and journalists before going with a report from the like of the New York Post, TMZ and the like.

There are also those who make an effort to confuse or take advantage of situations, those just as deranged as those in major violent crimes will create personas that seem to be a certain person involved in the incident. In the Boston attack, some created accounts mimicking the suspects:

The'online postings' you're hearing about are from @dzhokhar_A, which was createdâ€¦today. It's fake: https://t.co/8Zjw8fOOe8-- Jared Keller

Or, they created accounts to take advantage of the situation.

The tactic is used for the user to get a thrill, to gain followers and flip the account to a real account with a large followership, or simply to create confusion because they have some kind of agenda against how the situation is playing out.

I even saw reputable journalists retweeting some of these accounts.

Quick ways to identify fake accounts:

- Did they start tweeting the same day of the event?

- Do their tweets go back months and years?

- Are they verified?

- Is their tweet(s) being shared by multiple reliable sources?

- Why is the tweet asking for a retweet in such a tragic situation?

You have and will always hear the holy bitch about the importance of being accurate before being first.

No doubt, in journalism, accuracy is as important as being first. But, note that it isn't more important, as you hear: it is as important.

You hear the preaching that this or that outlet -- CNN is taking copious heat for the aforementioned incorrect suspect in custody report -- should have waited to report until they had the information confirmed, and some even further, should have waited until you "knew for sure."

There is rarely absolute assured information in breaking news.

Most anyone who works breaking news will tell you that the first breaking news report will probably be altered in subsequent reports to fall in line with how the event actually occurred.

And even then, you will sometimes find out minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades later that what was thought to be true was in fact not quite so and it actually happened like this.

Ultimately, the human mind provides for a great imagination in piecing together the information it ingests.

And so, it can connect and output even the most well-intended errors:

MT @AdamHardingNews: This guy just had the cops called on him because people called PD after FBI released photos http://t.co/VBVvju3sLx-- Michael Rusch

Browse links

Lessons From Breaking News During The Boston Marathon Manhunt

Ultimately, Humans:

Reporting Scanner Traffic:

A look at how online scanners are managed.

#mikemulugeta

Body of Missing Student at Brown Is Discovered

It Wasn't Sunil Tripathi: The Anatomy of a Misinformation Disaster

The Fog Of War:

Preliminary investigation at JFK Library plays down possibility of explosion

Fire at JFK Library caused by discarded smoking material

Allegedly, Maybe, Reportedly, Supposedly, Possibly, Unconfirmed, Trying To Confirm:

Suspects, Subjects, Persons of Interest, Witnesses:

Journalist vs. Reporter:

Unfortunately, Law Enforcement, Outlets and Journalists Can Get It Wrong, Too:

Boston Globe editor Brian McGrory on paywalls, misinformation, and social media

Media Melts Down Over Reports Of Boston Suspect

Social Sources:

Reddit Thinks It Can Solve the Boston Bombings

New York Posting And InfoWaring:

New York Post stands by 'Bag Men' story

6 Mind-Blowingly Ridiculous Conspiracy Theories Surrounding The Boston Bombing

View this video on YouTube

Breaking The News First:

View this video on YouTube

Lessons From Breaking News During The Boston Marathon Manhunt

Ultimately, Humans:

Reporting Scanner Traffic:

The Fog Of War:

Allegedly, Maybe, Reportedly, Supposedly, Possibly, Unconfirmed, Trying To Confirm:

Suspects, Subjects, Persons of Interest, Witnesses:

Journalist vs. Reporter:

Unfortunately, Law Enforcement, Outlets and Journalists Can Get It Wrong, Too:

Social Sources:

New York Posting And InfoWaring:

View this video on YouTube

Breaking The News First:

View this video on YouTube

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