Richard L. Fox and Robert W. Van Sickel

In the following viewpoint, Richard L. Fox and Robert W. Van Sickel claim that television coverage of high-profile trials, such as the O.J. Simpson and Rodney King cases, miseducates the public about the legal system. According to the authors, television coverage overemphasizes the personal and dramatic elements of trials instead of informing its audience about the complexities of the legal system. Fox is an assistant professor of political science at Union College in Schenectady, New York, and Van Sickel is an assistant professor of political science at Purdue University Calumet in Hammond, Indiana. They are the coauthors of Tabloid Justice: Criminal Justice in an Age of Media Frenzy, the book from which the following viewpoint has been excerpted...