We really had a field day with the story of Caroline Kangogo, the police constable on the run, suspected of killing a male colleague in Nakuru and a businessman in Ruiru within 48 hours.
In the end, we ended up sensationalizing the entire story, and ultimately, sexualising murder. We ended up with Hollywood movie scripts instead of cold, factual and objective reporting of murder.
For starters we described Kangogo as “a sharp shooter’ on a ‘killing spree.’ Now, wait a minute-this suspect (and, although we have made it sound like a foregone conclusion that she is ‘a killer-cop,’ she remains a suspect until proven guilty by a court of law) is being investigated for two killings. Two-not three, not four, not five-two!
Now, at what point does a killing become a spree? A basic dictionary meaning of spree is “an unrestrained indulgence.” The key word here is ‘indulgence,” so “killing spree” in this context would mean a series of killings, and Kangogo will have to kill more people before anyone that studied basic English grammar can begin to describe hers as ‘a killing spree.”
But we had to use ‘spree’ to make her story sound sexy. In the end, what we had was ‘a spree of words’ and heavily sexualised language too: “She had spent the night with Peter Ndwiga, whose body was found at a hotel room in Ruiru….that the two had booked room number 107 at Hotel Dedamax at 4pm on Monday where they spent the night.”
Sex, sex, and more sex….sexualising murder it is!
And wait a minute – were we not a wee-bit insensitive here to the family and friends of Mr. Ndwiga, especially the wife and children, who believed their father was on a business trip somewhere, and according to the children’s grandfather, only learnt about the death of Ndwiga “through the media?”
The Independent Press Standards Organization in Press reporting on a death cautions journalists reporting on death to “approach members of the public with sympathy and discretion, not publish information that might cause any unnecessary upset to friends and family of the person who has died and they do not break the news of a death to the immediate family.
Unnecessarily upsetting details like: “…Ms Kagongo lured the man to the room after paying for it, before savagely shooting him in the head at point-blank range.” Very dramatic for a movie script, but not for a hard news story that needs hard, cold facts.
Chapter 18: National Victims Assistance Academy: The News Media’s Coverage of Crime and Victimization warns against reporting rumours or innuendoes about the victim, the offender, or the crime unless such information has been verified by reliable sources, or as award-winning crime reporter Pamela Colloff puts it we should “remember the humanity of everyone involved,”
But in the heat of Kangogo story, we threw these basics to the dogs.
In the rush to be the first in the blood-thirsty pack, some of us took the hunt a notch higher: “Nation.Africa has further obtained a blood-spattered receipt with the name of Caroline Kagongo. The receipt found in one of the man’s pockets indicates that Sh3,020 was paid to Jogoo Kimakia County Lodge Thika…”
Now, if such a ‘blood-spattered receipt’ indeed existed, wouldn’t it be a well guarded crime exhibit in the hands of the Police? How then did Nation.Africa ‘obtain’ the ‘blood-spattered receipt’ unless they one, violated a crime scene by searching a dead man’s pockets and two, an overzealous police officer was feeding them with lurid details of the killing at the expense of ongoing investigations?
And then more heavily sexualized hearsay: “Detectives in Nakuru say the female officer was entangled in a web of love affairs…..One of her colleagues said the woman has been involved in several dramas with her lovers…”
On the other hand, the man Kangogo is suspected to have killed is described as “… an honest and disciplined officer who carried out his duties with much diligence.”
There is a sniff of sexism here.
The Star too, could not resist the sexist angle to the story, quoting DCI George Kinoti saying: “We are cautioning members of the public especially men to be on the lookout for the rogue officer, who is luring men to her trap before executing them in cold blood.” (‘Italics our ours)
Aha! How come, despite a long list of rogue male police officers out there killing their girlfriends and wives, we do not hear of police warning members of the public especially women, to be on the lookout for rogue officers luring women …before executing them in cold blood?
We will tell you how come – because Kangogo is a woman; because, dulled by stories of male police officers killing their girlfriends every other day, we had to sexualise her story; because hers is a (wo)man bite dog story.
And finally, a triangle is exactly that – a triangle, three-sided and all. When more sides are added, it is no longer a triangle but, say, a rectangle, polygon etc? So, “Police pursue love triangle” in this case, is, not straight reporting of facts, but a triangular reporting of rumours.
