Police, Crime and Blazing Buildings

1. Both jobs deal in human suffering, usually by loss of life or property, so they wouldn’t be too different. I would jump on the opportunity to advance in my career as a reporter, moving the contents of my desk in a couple of minutes. The two jobs are fairly similar in how the information is gathered, so it would not be a big change. For example, the mortuary form is essentially the same kind of information you could find in a police report, except for funeral times. You must also interview people who are connected with the victims of a crime or accident, which is very important with obituary stories; and in both cases you must be sensitive to the feelings of those connected with the tragedy.


2. Though both types of stories are similar, there is a large difference between the two. With crime stories, tragedy has recently struck and people haven’t had time to prepare for it, making them less likely to want to talk, though “They are able to talk“ (278). Dissimilarly, people interviewed for obituaries generally have had time to think about what they would like to say and there has been time to prepare for a death. This difference may make it difficult to shift from one department to the other, since the reporter may be used to having people ready and willing to talk to them.